This is a higher beginner’s Mandarin Chinese course, designed for non-Chinese speakers, who have had some Mandarin lessons or instructions, to continue developing their listening and speaking abilities, so that they can carry on more sophisticated conversations in Mandarin.
The learning medium of this course is pinyin, which is a widely accepted Romanisation system of Mandarin sounds. Students are not required to learn any Chinese characters. Learning how to read and write Chinese texts is dealt fully at separate Chinese courses, using the Chinese Reading and Writing series.
Mandarin Express Intro Level B focuses on listening and speaking Mandarin, covering ten fundamental topics, such as, discussing jobs, introducing family members, describing houses and furnitures, planning leisure activities, talking about the weather, and so on. Important structures and essential words are introduced in a conversational context. This Chinese course are very interesting and highly relevant to our daily lives, teaching students useful phrases and expressions which they can easily apply into the real world.
There are many interactive and communicative class activities in this Chinese course. Students have sufficient opportunities to speak Mandarin with each other and with the teacher. They are encouraged to use Mandarin as often as they can and to keep exchanges in English at its minimum.
The course materials include a separate Work Book, which helps students improving their Mandarin tremendously, especially the listening comprehension, which is the hardest needle to move in any language training. All listening exercises in the Work Book are controlled exercises, which means that they contain near zero new words or phrases. This type of listening exercises are necessary for lower level students to develop their Mandarin listening abilities. Without worrying about whether or not they have enough vocabulary, as they would in a real world situation, they can concentrate their effort in differentiating the sounds, and comprehending the meaning, so that they can be well prepared for communicating with native Chinese speakers.
