Pinyin Practice

I have an 80 mile commute every day and often find myself listening to NPR. Coverage on China has increased as the Olympics approach, but also as China continues to grow economically and politically. One of my favorite NPR shows will be broadcasting from Chengdu the week of May 19th-23rd. A blog is already relating the travel tales from the show hosts/producers as they make their way to China. Actually, I’m not sure who’s writing the blog. Looking forward to the stories though. Find your local NPR station for show times.

Studypond is an interesting website. They have a good tag line: Making Mandarin Manageable. A reporter on NPR the other day mentioned that television sure likes its alliterations, and I suspect the web does as well (this site is no exception). I like the idea of language partners and tutors. Doesn’t look like there are too many tutors on the site just yet. Perhaps in time.

Must give a shout-out to Eric O. from Primezero for all his efforts in helping me set up the Pinyin Practice Chop on the left (just below the poll). It’s available for WordPress and for iGoogle and any webpage or blog really. Just grab what you need from his download page. Or you might just opt for the chop generator and save the image from there. So many possibilities.

The Opposites of Chinese characters

Originally uploaded by Joseph S. Huang

For those still working on characters. The directions for the activity say “write the opposite character… 8 points”. This clever kid wrote them upside down. Partial credit?

There are several examples of their curriculum on Youtube. Just search for activechinese.