Product Description

An innovative book of exercises and language tasks for all learners of Mandarin Chinese.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #98866 in Books
• Published on: 2006-06-29
• Original language: English, Chinese
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 184 pages

From the Back Cover
A brand new title for the Modern Grammars series to add to the existing European Languages and to the forthcoming Japanese title.  The grammar will present Chinese as spoken in the PRC (sepcifically, that spoken aroung Beijing) and give all examples in simplified characters, traditional characters, romanisation (pinyin) and in translation.  It will follow the series structure (two parts - one for grammar structures, one for functions), with an accompanying workbook.  Linguistic jargon will be kept to a minimum throughout.  We will also be creating an accompanying homepage for the workbook with additional exercises (and a reporting system enabling students to send their results to their tutors); this we hope will go further to enhance the performance of the workbook. 

Customer Reviews

An uninspired rush job
This book of exercises linked to Ross and Ma's _Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar_ turned out to be a disappointment. The exercises are generally trite and mechanical, often of the fill-in-the-blank variety, and seem as if they were put together with a minimum of effort, creativity, or interest in teaching languages. Simply put, the book is dull and gives the impression of being a rush job. It furthermore suffers from numerous typographical errors. It may be useful as a way of reviewing the material in the parent volume, but I expect that active students can easily devise equivalent or better study techniques on their own than those presented in this book. On a positive note, the publisher did splurge on an attractive cover for the volume.

Could have been much better
I bought this book as a companion to the excellent 'Practical Guide' by the same authors.

The concept is good - exercises that test and reinforce what has been taught in the Guide. The book has the same attractive and easy-to-use design as the Guide. It is helpful to have the answers at the end of the book.

Unfortunately some of the exercises are unsatisfactory. In some cases the answers directly contradict the advice given in the Guide. The leaves the learner wondering whether the answers are incorrect or whether there are alternative usages, not explained in the Guide. In other cases the answers introduce new concepts or vocabulary that the learner could not possibly be expected to learn from the Guide. An example of a particularly unhelpful set of exercises is the one on prepositions.

This book could have been really useful if it had been checked more carefully (it is difficult to imagine that any learners were asked to trial the exercises before publication). It would also have been useful if the answers were accompanied by explanatory notes.

The book is not a total disaster but it could have been much better.

Fantastic resource for Chinese learners
This is a brilliant accompaniment to the Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar book- one of the best resources for Chinese learners on the market. Using the books in tandem means you can read about a grammar point, and then turn to the corresponding chapter in the workbook to find exercises to help cement this knowledge. The book also includes answers, is extremely well laid out and user-friendly. Highly recommended!