Re: How many years dedicated to characters learning in China ?


"Sébastien de Mapias" <sglrigaud@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:1165337706.379109.48610@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
(in China and elsewhere...)

Hi again,

1/ So given the extreme difference between our alphabet(s) and
the "sinogrammes" (is there a word equivalent in English ?),
how many years of school do the Chinese pupils spend learning
their writing system ?? Are there thousands of characters *only*,
or are we talking about tens of thousands of characters to retain ??
Pretty early in France (after 4 or 5 years if I correctly remember)
we start doing class written assignments (that we call
"dissertations"),
is there any stage during their schooling where young Chinese
can do the same ?!?

Firstly, children in China entering school have one great advantage. They speak some form of Chinese language, or are exposed to it via the media, in advance of schooling. They therefore have a basic subconcious knowledge of how to string sentences together (i.e. they have a fundamental grasp of grammar and syntax) from words that they know, (i.e. a wide vocabulary already) all from a spoken national language they're exposed to. When they begin junior school, they aim to learn around a few hundred characters per year. In the first six years of education, they are taught to be able to recognise at least 2600 different characters.


2/ I read there are 214 keys: do ALL characters contain one of these ?
Or there are exceptions ??

In China, they don't use the 214 significs system very often. The mainland uses simplified characters and there are several different sets varying from 189 (or there abouts) to 227 significs. They're useful for locating characters in dictionaries, but in general, some are rarely used, compared to some which have many hundreds of different characters under its heading.



3/ Let's say I'm a 30-year old Chinese, quietly listening my favorite
radio/TV station: suddenly the speaker uses a syllable/word I've
never heard before: how will I manage to find it in my dictionary
(which is a good one but does not contain pinyin entries; by the
way, do Chinese dictionaries have pinyin references ?) ??


If you've a good ear, then pinyin, but having no pinyin entry, you would have to guess from what you know about phonetic elements in a character's make up. If the character doesn't have a phonetic element, then you're really quite stuck. Yes, many character dictionaries have pinyin references, which is why you should choose a dictionary some time after you start learning characters. That way, your course will introduce you to the main meanings first, and let you form an idea about the sound associations. Hopefully there is guidance when you need it.

Otherwise, there are the old style riming dictionaries where all the characters are graded according to their rime, then their rime, and then by initial. But I've not really met a modern one, only reproductions of old ones, like Guangyun.


4/ The other way: I'm reading my favorite newspaper, and here
I stumble against a character I've never seen before: how can
I read it aloud ?? How can I know how to pronounce it ??

You can't really, without learning a dictionary defined pronunciation for it, which means you'll have to look it up.

Dyl.

.

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