The Chinese Reading and Writing series Enhanced Editions have been released. A few changes have been made to the pages. Here we are going to explain briefly the differences between an Enhanced Edition of Chinese Reading and Writing book and its 2nd Edition. 

Let’s call the enhanced version Chinese Reading and Writing 2.0.

When holding a copy of Chinese Reading and Writing 2.0 book, nothing seems to be majorly different from a regular book, except the book 2.0 is printed on higher quality paper. 

Indeed, that’s the beauty of a Chinese Reading and Writing 2.0 book. It looks like a regular book, and it feels like a regular book. You can do all sort of things you do on a regular book, underlining texts, writing notes, folding a dog ear, or doodling on it. Indeed, there are many reasons that we love paper books (Learn more here: Advantages of paper textbooks).

Therefore, to make sure people know which version of the book they are getting, we designed a new book cover for the 2.0 books.

When flipping the pages of a book 2.0, you’ll notice small QR codes are added along the Chinese texts. You won’t find these QR codes in a regular Chinese Reading and Writing book. 

Each QR code is connected to a particular online video lesson. Scan a QR codes and you can start learning immediately. There are a total of 112 online lessons available for the entire Chinese Reading and Writing series.

You are encouraged to ignore these QR codes when you have had a good grasp of all the Chinese texts, completed all the end-of-chapter challenges, and finished all the additional writing worksheets. 

In Chinese Reading and Writing book 1 and book 2, apart from the QR codes, you’ll notice this small icon  appears on a few pages. This is something a regular Chinese Reading and Writing book does not have either. 

This icon can be read by a Chinese Learning Pen. Touches this icon with your Chinese Learning Pen, you’ll hear some explanatory notes in English. This is the supporting Teacher’s note, explaining an important point in the book.

The idea behind this icon is to provide additional information for students, and it was conceived before the rolling out of all the online writing lessons. Once the online lessons proved themselves to be more illustrative than audio explanations and more engaging, we decided not to include this icon in the subsequent Chinese Reading and Writing book 3 - 6. 

The real difference between a regular Chinese Reading and Writing book and a book 2.0 is nearly invisible. It’s an extra layer printed on each page. If you look really hard, or use a magnifying glass, you’ll see a massive amount of tiny dots spreading throughout the pages.

This layer of dots is the biggest change and the real difference, and it is something can’t be replicated. This is where the technology comes in and how your Chinese Learning Pen gets activated. These dots are tiny, but enable the Pen to bring out high quality audio output from the pages. This is awesome!

With the QR codes added and this super cool technology integrated into the pages, Chinese Reading and Writing 2.0 books became really versatile. They can be used as any regular books, or can come alive when you want them to be. 

Need a particular Chinese lesson on a particular part of texts? Take your smartphone out and scan a QR code.

Need to accelerate your Chinese character recognition process? Use your Chinese Learning Pen to touch and listen to any of the Chinese texts in the book. The native Chinese voicing you hear will also improves your listening skills and Chinese pronunciations.