Adult false beginners need an approach that does not bore them by starting from absolute zero or reading insipid children’s textbooks, but instead acknowledges that they are busy people who have abundant knowledge of the real world and little time to waste on inefficient techniques such as rote memorization of boring content.

False beginners = people who already know some basic Chinese characters and probably a lot more spoken Chinese. I am working on a series of lessons that capitalizes on this rich background. Here is part of a sample lesson:

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Standing outside a watch shop in Taipei, an adult will notice that the window display includes three types of objects: clocks, watches and personal chops. A sign outside the shop includes ten different Chinese characters: 刻印 (1, 2)、鐘錶修理 (3 ~ 6)、換電池 (7 ~ 9)、換錶帶 (7, 4, 10). What does the sign say?

Use the Easy Characters to Guess the Unknowns

3 & 4: Characters 3 and 4 both include the metal radical (釒) on the left, so they probably have something to do with metal. The right hand sides include 童 tóng (as in 兒童 értóng / erltorng) and 表 biǎo / beau (as in 表哥、表弟 biǎogē, biǎodì / beauge, beaudih “maternal male cousin”). You can therefore guess that 鐘錶 must be the similar-sounding characters for “clocks and watches”: zhōngbiǎo / jongbeau.

6: Character 6 (理) includes the element 里 (in left-right characters, most phonetic elements appear on the right) which is part of 裡 (as in 裡面、外面 lǐmian, wàimian / lii.miann, way.miann “inside, outside”), you can guess that 鐘錶修理 is pronounced zhōngbiǎo xiūlǐ / jongbeau shioulii “clocks and watches repaired”.

7 ~ 9: 換電池 contains two unknown characters, but there are familiar elements.

Character 7 換 includes the hand radical (扌), so it must have something to do with hands.

Character 9 池 includes the water radical (氵), so it must be connected with liquid of some sort.

Character 8 is a common and very easy character: 電 diàn / diann “electricity”. Aha! 電池 diànchí / diannchyr is an “electric pool” (lead acid batteries contain an acid bath of sorts).

Now you can guess that 換電池 huàn diànchí / huan diannchyr must mean “change the batteries [in an electric watch]”. After all, that’s what watch shops do!

10: 帶 Character 10 includes the (巾) jīn / jin “towel, scarf” radical, so 換錶帶 must be huàn biǎodài / huann beauday “change watch straps” After all, that’s the other thing that watch shops do

1 & 2: How about those unknown characters 刻印 at the very top of the sign?

Character 1 刻 includes the knife radical (刂), a shortened form of 刀 dāo / dau “knife” when used as an independent character. Since this watch shop includes personal chops in its window display, they probably also carve chops (which requires some sort of “knife”).

[watch a calligrapher carve a piece of wood into a chop from start to finish: 5 minutes]

刻印 probably means “carve chops”, but you don’t know any very common characters with these components, so you can't immediately guess at the pronunciation (you're only a false beginner). Don’t worry about such details.

It’s much more satisfying and motivating to focus on common characters: intelligent students don’t obsess over unknowns.

You therefore resolve to ignore these these two characters for the time being. A few weeks/months from now, when you know many more characters, you may be able to guess at the pronunciation. You can also look them up in a dictionary (but as a responsible adult, you don't really have much spare time).

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This teaching approach is only suitable for false beginners, adults who already know some basic Chinese and would feel insulted or bored by children’s books or textbooks for foreign beginners. If you would like to see more material like this, please register here:
https://tinyurl.com/FalseBeg-Chin
https: // tinyurl . com / FalseBeg-Chin (remove the spaces)

I will contact you when this experimental material is ready.

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Who I am: https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@wentong-syhhae/enthusiastic-intp-polyglot