1.7 How to memorise and combine characters

In Chinese, some characters can look a bit like the objects they represent and so often a good way to memorise the characters is to imagine them pictorially.

For example, the character for a person ‘rén’ is 人, which looks like a person walking:

Side on view of a person walking.
Figure 4 The character ‘rén 人’, meaning person, looks like a person walking.

To learn how to write this character, download the Chinese@OU app to your mobile device and go to Lesson 3, writing section.

A second example of how Chinese characters can be turned into an image that relates to its meaning is the word for ‘big’. Imagine a person with their arms wide open to signal something is big; the character for big, ‘ 大, looks just like that.

A person standing with their arms wide open on the top of a hill.
Figure 5 The character ‘ 大’, meaning big, looks like a person standing with their arms wide open.

To learn how to write this character, download the Chinese@OU app to your mobile device and go to Lesson 6, writing section.

Activity 5 Word combinations

Based on what you have learned so far in this course, select the correct word combination for the definitions given.

Adult/Big person (dà rén)

 

We (wŏ mén)

 

China (Zhōng guó)

 

A power (a dominant country) (dà guó)

 

Doctor (yī shēng)

 

Study Chinese (xué zhōng wén)