Written Chinese Made Easy A Beginner's Guide to Learning the Chinese Characters

Forget the old rote method, learn Chinese characters the fun and accessible way! Chinese characters are the oldest continuously used writing system in the world, and also one of the most complicated. Chinese Characters Made Easy presents the 1,000 most common characters and applies mnemonics to associate each character with a visual and verbal clue - making memorization easy. By associating a character's meaning to a simple sketch that quickly identifies the character, learners develop an additional layer of context to aid in memorization. Presented in groups or clusters that share common elements and meanings, the characters become easy to identify and remember within the context of the group. The character groups all share common root symbols (radicals) relating to a particular theme such as colors, numbers, animals or body parts. Pronunciations, meanings and vocabulary pairs are also provided for each character in the group. Highly visual, this book is an excellent language learning tool for serious students as well as general readers curious about the Chinese writing system. Chinese Characters Made Easy includes: Audio recordings of native-speaker pronunciations for all the characters An introduction to the history and structure of the Chinese writing system 1,000 characters and over 3,000 words for beginning learners of Chinese