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MandarinX: Mandarin Chinese Essentials

4.5 stars
6 ratings

This course is your first crucial step to learning Mandarin Chinese. Learn essential skills for communicating in Chineseincluding tones, pinyin, grammar, characters, and basic structures all within the context of a business environment.

5 weeks
4–10 hours per week
Self-paced
Progress at your own speed
Free
Optional upgrade available

There is one session available:

55,824 already enrolled! After a course session ends, it will be archivedOpens in a new tab.
Starts Mar 19

About this course

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Chinese is a critical language for all global organizations. Mandarin Chinese Essentials features a thorough basic Chinese virtual learning experience at your pace!

Switching from Latin alphabet or other phonogram languages to Chinese can be intimidating and frustrating. This prerequisite course breaks down all basic characteristics of Chinese language, ensuring you have a solid foundation to be a competent speaker in a business environment.

We will introduce one rule with practices and related dialogues through videos that includepractical businessconversations.

We provide solid learning system that is essential for beginners to differentiate and construct sentences, and then use them in workplace and business scenarios.

If you enroll in the verified track, you will be able to participate in the Webinar lectured by Dr. Estella Y. Chen, who will lead thediscussionwitha wide variety ofpopulartopicstoaccompanyyou to the world of chinese business culture and trend.

What's more, in the verified track, we'll give you three pronunciation lessons that will help youcommunicate more smoothly and effectively ina business environment.

No previous knowledge needed. We start from the beginning!

This course was developed with the assistance of Dr. Haohsiang Liao, Director of the Chinese Language Program at MIT.

At a glance

What you'll learn

Skip What you'll learn
  • Five essential characteristics of Mandarin Chinese: tones, pinyin, grammar, characters, and basic structures
  • Greater insight into Chinese culture
  • Essential and practical communication skills
  • A solid start toward masteringMandarin for business
  • Build your confidence to communicate effectively with colleagues, clients, and friends in Chinese

Week 1: Tones
Learn the most crucial characteristic of Mandarin Chinese-tones. You cannot speak Mandarin without singing, without tones.

Week 2: Pinyin
It is absolutely useful for beginners to learn Pinyin, a transcription consisting of Latin characters.

Week 3: Chinese characters
After learning Pinyin and tones, you may try to 'draw' characters stroke by stroke.

Week 4: One Character One Syllable
It is essential to know that one character contains only one syllable. There is no prefix or suffix in Chinese.

W eek 5: One basic Chinese structure
Introduction to basic Chinese structure, knowing and practicing basic sentences in everyday scenario.

Learner testimonials

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“A very well put together Mandarin Chinese course with lots of helpful examples and videos. Great introduction to the language. Estella brings lots of experience to the class and is a fantastic professor.”
-- previous student

This course is part of Business Mandarin Essentials Professional Certificate Program

Learn more 
Expert instruction
2 skill-building courses
Self-paced
Progress at your own speed
3 months
4 - 10 hours per week

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