This is intended for people studying Chinese in China inside and outside of class.

Flash Cards

Besides focused tutoring by a native Chinese speaker, flash cards are the best way to learn and remember vocabulary. Pleco flascards will be the best tool for this job since you can add cards very easily from dictionary entries and organize them into catagories.

Studying for Class

Tingxie: My recommendation is to buy a 方格本 (a small notebook with larger grids to copy characters and space for pinyin above them). When you get a list of words, write each word 5-10 times in this book, writing the pinyin above it and pronouncing the characters as you write them. Once you go through, cover up the character and definition, then try to recall the character and its english meaning after saying the pinyin aloud. If you can’t write it, make a dot next to it on the list. Then eliminate any words you got wrong and repeatedly copy the words that you couldn’t recall. Keep narrowing them down like this until you get them all.

Presentations: Make the PPT, practice presenting in Chinese to an imaginary audience, then use pleco to search for every word you don’t know. Add all these words to a pleco flashcard catagory, then go through those flash cards 2-3x making sure you’ve memorized them.

Tests: Go through any practice questions in the book. For every grammar you think will be on the test, write a few example sentances from scratch.