Teaching Chinese at Home

[porcupine12trade]

ksme:

Hi. Found this list of chinese supplementary readers for primary school on MOE website. Thought it is useful for parents wondering what type of chinese readers to get for their kids.


http://www.moe.gov.sg/resources/files/chinese-supplementary-readers-primary.pdf

I noticed that 不一样的卡梅拉 are listed as for P3-4 while 杨红樱成长主题绘本 series of books are stated as for P1-2.

Hi ksme

Thanks for the link. V useful for me ad I'm always search for suitable books for me kids. I really believe reading is the way to go. I'm desperate for my kids to pick up chinese story books on their own!

[tamarind]

phankao:

tamarind:

[quote]
I think I'd browsed through 可爱的鼠小弟 before as there's quite a number of them in the library. I've not borrowed them bc the words so small that my \"old flower eyes\" have to narrow real hard to focus on! Need to get magnifying glass!

I just measured the size of the words in the 可爱的鼠小弟, it is 7mm tall.
That is already twice as big as the size of Chinese words in newspapers, which are only 3mm tall. My 70+ year old mother reads Chinese newspapers everyday and never complain leh. She does not need magnifying glasses to read newspapers.

Your mother's eyesight is powerful then and so is yours, thanks to great genes. I can't help it that my eyesight is terrible can I?! Why laugh at me? I know my child has much better eyesight than me, but I have to see it too to make sure he's reading the words correctly. I've been wearing progressive lenses for the past 10 years. I don't like it either.[/quote]
I am not laughing at you lah. A lot of people read Chinese newspapers, so I don't see why there is a problem with the size of the characters, cannot be so many people have powerful eyesight. My hubby cannot see anything without his glasses, but he can read Chinese newspapers with his glasses on and do not need magnifying glasses.

I thought you were joking when you said that size of the words in 可爱的鼠小弟 is too small. That is why I put the smiling face. The fact is that many other children's books have smaller words than that. Now that you mentioned that it is because your eyesight is not good, then we understand.

可爱的鼠小弟 has excellent reviews from experts, and it is one of the best children's books in Japan and China. Parents should not deny their kids of the joy of reading 可爱的鼠小弟.

[laughingcat]

Hi Tamarind,


Can you introduce DD books on Chinese Compo? Coz my cousin's kids in Primary school are struggling with it. I am thinking of putting it in my upcoming orders leh.

[tamarind]

porcupine12trade:

tamarind:

I just measured the size of the words in the 可爱的鼠小弟, it is 7mm tall.
That is already twice as big as the size of Chinese words in newspapers, which are only 3mm tall. My 70+ year old mother reads Chinese newspapers everyday and never complain leh. She does not need magnifying glasses to read newspapers.

Phew, for a moment I was worried the words are too tiny Coz I ordered from dangdang n looking fwd to receive them.

The words in 可爱的鼠小弟 are bigger than １4只老鼠
I just looked through 可爱的鼠小弟, the difficult words have hanyu pinyin (very few).

[tamarind]

laughingcat:

Hi Tamarind,


Can you introduce DD books on Chinese Compo? Coz my cousin's kids in Primary school is struggling with it. I am thinking of putting it in my upcoming orders leh.

I have this series of books from P1 to P6 :

大鼻子李教授新体验作文
http://product.dangdang.com/product.aspx?product_id=9268385&ref=search-1-pub

These books require kids to be already reading very well. Personally I think it is good, but honestly it is not easy to use. I have scanned a few pages from the series, if you are interested to view, PM me your gmail account and I can share the files with you. You must have a google account.

[laughingcat]

Hi Tamarind, PM you already. Once again THANKS SO MUCH! :celebrate:

[phankao]

tamarind:

A lot of people read Chinese newspapers, so I don't see why there is a problem with the size of the characters, cannot be so many people have powerful eyesight. .

Bc newspaper's font is normal font, not \"artistic\" font.

[tamarind]

I just compared 可爱的鼠小弟 to my kids' primary 1 Chinese textbook, the font looks the same leh. About half the words in the P1 textbook are the same size as the words in the 可爱的鼠小弟 books.


For the information of other parents,
Here is a photo from 可爱的鼠小弟 :
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_w1nyHWTEh94/S2kyCSwngSI/AAAAAAAABic/ssQLAqcyWQ4/s400/c6.JPG\">

Berries enrichment class also use this type of font, so it should be the normal font.

[tamarind]

laughingcat:

Hi Tamarind, PM you already. Once again THANKS SO MUCH! :celebrate:

Hi laughingcat,
You are welcome I replied you already.

[tamarind]

porcupine12trade:

I kind of agree such seemingly easy books do have some very difficult Chinese words. For eg １4只老鼠，i showed my 19yo cousin who is waiting for her A level results, there were couple of words she can't recognize. She did HCL in school and from NJC, so I was abit surprised. I myself can't read those words too so need to check dic.

I remember words like :

蹿 cuān
攥 zuàn

in picture books meant for kids below 5 years old : 阿秋和阿狐 and 提姆与莎兰系列. There are at most 2 or 3 words that are so difficult in each book.

I think that these words are probably commonly used in China, but never used in Singapore. I consider it good exposure to my kids