Centre of Excellence – Mandarin Chinese for Beginners Diploma Course

The Mandarin Chinese for Beginners Diploma Course teaches the fundamental concepts of pronunciation, as well as the basic grammar and vocabulary needed to participate in simple daily conversations. It introduces concepts that are unique to the Chinese language, which will then provide a framework you can use to express almost anything you want.

The course also contains relatable dialogues based on real-life scenarios that will equip you with many useful phrases to help you feel comfortable in social and professional interactions. Furthermore, the course has been designed to cover the needs of tourists, whether it is to ask for directions or to order food in a restaurant.

This course:

• Includes a downloadable audio version of each module (10 in total + an introduction and a conclusion)
• Explains how to apply the principles of Chinese pronunciation and tones to read any Chinese pinyin
• Allows you to have a basic conversation in Mandarin Chinese
• Explains key vocabulary in both simplified characters and pinyin
• Explores concepts and grammatical structures
• Provides a “Let’s Practice” subsection following each key learning point
• Ensures understanding with useful phrases or dialogue based on real-life scenarios
• Tests knowledge retention with multiple-choice assessments

Designed for those who have had little to no interaction with Mandarin Chinese, this course will take you from absolute beginner to being comfortable reading pinyin and using a variety of sentence structures to talk about yourself, as well as to ask and answer questions.

The wide range of examples, relatable expressions and real-life dialogues included in the course will boost your confidence in having basic conversations on topics such as exchanging personal information, discussing daily arrangements and food, asking about prices, chatting about your hobbies, the weather, and more.

The content in this course is based on the first level in the Hànyǔ Shuǐpíng Kǎoshì (Chinese Proficiency Test), usually referred to as HSK, which assesses the ability of a non-native speaker to use Chinese in their daily, academic and professional life.

There are a total of six levels in HSK, with HSK Level 1 being equivalent to the A1 Level in the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.