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Pimsleur Comprehensive Chinese (Mandarin) #1
Chinese (Mandarin) I, Comprehensive: Learn to Speak and Understand Mandarin Chinese with Pimsleur Language Programs
This course teaches Mandarin, also known as Standard Chinese. Mandarin is the official spoken language in Mainland China and Taiwan. It is also widely spoken in Singapore and Malaysia, and it is one of the five official languages of the UN. Mandarin is used in Chinese schools, colleges, universities, and in the media. Learn Mandarin Chinese today with Pimsleur.Comprehensive Mandarin Chinese I includes 30 lessons of essential grammar and vocabulary -- 16 hours of real-life spoken practice sessions -- plus a Culture Booklet. Upon completion of this Level I program, you will have functional spoken proficiency with the most-frequently-used vocabulary and grammatical structures.
In the first 10 lessons, you’ll cover the basics: saying hello, asking for or giving information, scheduling a meal or a meeting, asking for or giving basic directions, and much more. You’ll be able to handle minimum courtesy requirements, understand much of what you hear, and be understood at a beginning level, but with near-native pronunciation skills.
In the next 10 lessons, you’ll build on what you’ve learned. Expand your menu, increase your scheduling abilities from general to specific, start to deal with currency and exchanging money, refine your conversations and add over a hundred new vocabulary items. You’ll understand more of what you hear, and be able to participate with speech that is smoother and more confident.
In the final 10 lessons, you’ll be speaking and understanding at an intermediate level. More directions are given in the target language, which moves your learning to a whole new plane. Lessons include shopping, visiting friends, going to a restaurant, plans for the evening, car trips, and talking about family.
One hour of recorded Cultural Notes are included at the end of Unit 30. These notes are designed to provide you with some insight into Chinese culture. A Notes Booklet is also included in PDF format.
In the first 10 lessons, you’ll cover the basics: saying hello, asking for or giving information, scheduling a meal or a meeting, asking for or giving basic directions, and much more. You’ll be able to handle minimum courtesy requirements, understand much of what you hear, and be understood at a beginning level, but with near-native pronunciation skills.
In the next 10 lessons, you’ll build on what you’ve learned. Expand your menu, increase your scheduling abilities from general to specific, start to deal with currency and exchanging money, refine your conversations and add over a hundred new vocabulary items. You’ll understand more of what you hear, and be able to participate with speech that is smoother and more confident.
In the final 10 lessons, you’ll be speaking and understanding at an intermediate level. More directions are given in the target language, which moves your learning to a whole new plane. Lessons include shopping, visiting friends, going to a restaurant, plans for the evening, car trips, and talking about family.
One hour of recorded Cultural Notes are included at the end of Unit 30. These notes are designed to provide you with some insight into Chinese culture. A Notes Booklet is also included in PDF format.
159 pages, Audio CD
First published January 1, 2000
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
May 13, 2016
Well, I've got all the way through this, and feel it's given me a reasonable if extremely elementary grounding in Mandarin. We shall see whether it does me any good in Beijing later this year (and actually I have time to get through Part II before then) but I am more than a little pleased to be able to listen to the conversations in the latter part of the course and understand them fully on first listen.
The interval repetition thing is done well and while it seems a little inefficient, listening to the same thing over and over again and in about 30 half-hour lessons covering really just the equivalent of the little Peace Corps course though with less vocab (see here - it's not bad) I find most of what I've learned fairly well embedded. Some small criticism: clarity of pronunciation is sometimes lacking, and for a cold beginner it's hard to tell the difference even between jin, xing, tian, dian and so on, so a printed summary of the lessons would be welcome (maybe there is one but I don't have it), as I had to look up the pinyin to properly distinguish what I was hearing at times. As the lessons progressed this all became less problematic. The tones are pretty clear and often emphasised, though why oh why oh why not just call them first tone etc, rather than "rising, high level, falling-rising and falling tones".
I listened to one lesson most mornings on my walk to work and that works fabulously - the perfect context for concentration, and especially for this sort of structured lesson where I knew by my location roughly when the new material would start coming in. Review is built in sufficiently that only rarely did I have to go back and do a lesson again, though I think I will repeat a few of the later ones at least in part before I move on to the second set.
Like all the Pimsleurs I've heard, it begins with an American trying to chat up a local girl and this one got rather creepy with the repeatedly rebuffed requests to come back to my place. She eventually tells him off politely: 你不明白我说什么.
Speaking of which I haven't found a compelling text to get on with writing yet, though Teach Yourself Beginner's Chinese Script is a start and the amazing Pleco app is useful. Onward.
The interval repetition thing is done well and while it seems a little inefficient, listening to the same thing over and over again and in about 30 half-hour lessons covering really just the equivalent of the little Peace Corps course though with less vocab (see here - it's not bad) I find most of what I've learned fairly well embedded. Some small criticism: clarity of pronunciation is sometimes lacking, and for a cold beginner it's hard to tell the difference even between jin, xing, tian, dian and so on, so a printed summary of the lessons would be welcome (maybe there is one but I don't have it), as I had to look up the pinyin to properly distinguish what I was hearing at times. As the lessons progressed this all became less problematic. The tones are pretty clear and often emphasised, though why oh why oh why not just call them first tone etc, rather than "rising, high level, falling-rising and falling tones".
I listened to one lesson most mornings on my walk to work and that works fabulously - the perfect context for concentration, and especially for this sort of structured lesson where I knew by my location roughly when the new material would start coming in. Review is built in sufficiently that only rarely did I have to go back and do a lesson again, though I think I will repeat a few of the later ones at least in part before I move on to the second set.
Like all the Pimsleurs I've heard, it begins with an American trying to chat up a local girl and this one got rather creepy with the repeatedly rebuffed requests to come back to my place. She eventually tells him off politely: 你不明白我说什么.
Speaking of which I haven't found a compelling text to get on with writing yet, though Teach Yourself Beginner's Chinese Script is a start and the amazing Pleco app is useful. Onward.
March 15, 2013
highly recommend for learning spoken Chinese.
May 3, 2019
I’ve been studying Mandarin Chinese on and off for 5 years now.
Out of all the tools and methods that I’ve used, this Pimsleur course has been by far the most effective tool for me for learning Chinese (I do recommend an introductory classroom course first to cover the basics before starting this).
The course is particularly effective at teaching you the right pronunciation of words (provided a teacher has already covered the very basics of Mandarin tones with you - tones are very important in Chinese).
It is also quite effective at teaching grammar elements and sentence structure because of the continued exposure to full sentences.
In short: I highly recommend this course to anyone looking to learn Mandarin Chinese.
Out of all the tools and methods that I’ve used, this Pimsleur course has been by far the most effective tool for me for learning Chinese (I do recommend an introductory classroom course first to cover the basics before starting this).
The course is particularly effective at teaching you the right pronunciation of words (provided a teacher has already covered the very basics of Mandarin tones with you - tones are very important in Chinese).
It is also quite effective at teaching grammar elements and sentence structure because of the continued exposure to full sentences.
In short: I highly recommend this course to anyone looking to learn Mandarin Chinese.
December 24, 2018
I’ve been meaning to learn Mandarin for a long time but didn’t have time for proper lessons so I decided to give this a try and I was not disappointed. I listened to the audiobook and slowly realized I was learning useful Mandarin words and phrases I could use in a common conversation. The pronunciation tricks and the conversational approach made me feel like I was making progress quickly. I still have a long way to go before I can proudly say I can speak Mandarin, but this was a solid first step that can supplement future lessons.
March 24, 2020
(Jomtien, Thailand)
May 8, 2014
It is truly a well-constructed system designed to help beginners acquire the most used (common) words and expressions. By the end of this book you should be able to have little conversations to ask for directions, eating/drinking out or at a friend's place, discussing about your family and making travel arrangements (taking the plane, etc).
I already had Chinese intermediate level so this was a bit below my level but it helped me practice my pronunciation as I had nobody with whom to converse in Chinese. But exactly for this reason, I was able to appreciate the system Pimsleur has, having already known the language beyond the level of this course, I could see the mechanism behind the course and why it has been created this way, and it is a really good method for learning.
However, as a side-note, this does not teach you grammar, its purpose is to get you talking Mandarin Chinese (even if you might make mistakes at times) and to help you feel the way Mandarin Chinese flow and debit should be. So if you're interested in learning Grammar, aside from the booklet in this course, search other Chinese tools to help you. Also, consider learning writing what you've so far learned, so that you practice the hanzi characters as well, I liked using two apps called "Biagrams" and "Characters" made by WrittenChinese.com, it's sort of flashcard-looking app, that helps you memorize the characters and it also explains in which expressions you will find that character.
I already had Chinese intermediate level so this was a bit below my level but it helped me practice my pronunciation as I had nobody with whom to converse in Chinese. But exactly for this reason, I was able to appreciate the system Pimsleur has, having already known the language beyond the level of this course, I could see the mechanism behind the course and why it has been created this way, and it is a really good method for learning.
However, as a side-note, this does not teach you grammar, its purpose is to get you talking Mandarin Chinese (even if you might make mistakes at times) and to help you feel the way Mandarin Chinese flow and debit should be. So if you're interested in learning Grammar, aside from the booklet in this course, search other Chinese tools to help you. Also, consider learning writing what you've so far learned, so that you practice the hanzi characters as well, I liked using two apps called "Biagrams" and "Characters" made by WrittenChinese.com, it's sort of flashcard-looking app, that helps you memorize the characters and it also explains in which expressions you will find that character.
April 27, 2019
Solid audio method, but it’s really missing a transcript. I get that a transcript is not essential for an audio method, but it would definitely help differentiate similar words in a tonal language like Mandarin Chinese.
May 3, 2012
This program is essential for beginners.
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February 15, 2016amazing value
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews