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Tones

There are four tones in Mandarin, which are the 1st tone as in “mā”, the 2nd tone as in “má”,the 3rd tone as in “mǎ” and the 4th tone as in “mà”.

The tones are very important in Chinese, because the tones make difference in meanings. But don’t get too worried about the tones, it is just a story to show the importance of the tones. Normally people would understand you even if your tones are not 100% accurate.

There are four basic tones in Chinese, respectively called the 1st tone, the 2nd tone, the 3rd tone and the 4th tone.

When two third-tone syllables are read in sequence, the first syllable turns into the second tone.

i.e., the 3+3 sequence becomes a 2+3 one.

However, when put in the written from, the original tone is kept.

Now we have learnt the Chinese syllables, which are made up of three parts-initials, finals and tones.

Please write down the pinyin for 你 and 好 after class.

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HSK Standard Course Level 1: 1.1

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FutureLearn - Learning For Life

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