How to use a Field Guide

Give your Chinese a place to settle

Every Field Guide is built around two readings on one topic. Everything else in the guide is there to help you understand them, practise them and keep them.

Start in English

Before You Start Exploring sets the scene in English, Chinese and pinyin. Read the English first. When you reach the Chinese, you already know what it's about, and your attention can go to the language.

Read the Chinese first

Each reading comes in three blocks: characters, then pinyin, then English. Start with the characters. Use the pinyin only where you're stuck, and the English only to check. That way you know what you understood, instead of assuming it.

Learn ten words at a time

The tag after each paragraph, such as [8–14], points to the rows that hold its new words. Learn them in batches of about ten, core words first: they're marked in red. The row numbers run on from list to list, so you can watch your total grow.

Write them by hand

The Writing Companion opens with stroke order, then gives every character in the guide its own space to trace and practise. Write each batch right after you've learned it. Writing by hand slows you down enough to see how a character is built.

See how the sentences work

The Grammar Spotlight takes the key structures straight from the readings. Each one comes with a second example, and a "watch out" for the most common mistake.

Test yourself, three times over

Do the exercises and check them against the answer key. Then return to the readings at the back of the guide, with less help each time: Appendix A in characters only, B in pinyin only, C in English only. Translate C back into Chinese. Each round asks you to recall what the last one gave you.

Choose your next topic

The guide closes with a Chinese saying and a page of related Field Guides. Every guide you finish adds a topic to your shelf.

Two weeks, twenty to thirty minutes at a time

A word you have to recall after a few days stays longer than one you read ten times in one evening. So keep sessions short and spread them out.

EVERY SESSION
1. Write last session's words from memory.
2. Learn up to ten new words, core words first.
3. Reread the paragraph they come from.
4. Write each new character in the Companion.
WEEK ONE
Day 1: Before You Dive In, then the first reading in characters.
Days 2–4: its new words, ten at a time.
Day 5: reread it aloud, then the Companion checkpoint.
WEEK TWO
Days 1–3: the second reading and its words.
Day 4: the Grammar Spotlight, one pattern at a time.
Day 5: the exercises, checked against the answer key.
A FEW DAYS LATER
Day 1: read Appendix A and mark every word you can't recall.
Day 2: read Appendix B and say each sentence aloud.
Day 3: translate Appendix C back into Chinese, then check it against the reading.
Day 4: Write from Memory in the Companion. Count how many words you still know.

Pick a topic you care about. Then give it two weeks.

Every guide adds a topic you own: the words, the grammar and the confidence to use them. Three topics is where it starts to add up.

Start with three Explore the Field Guides