Basics of Chinese Grammar Explained in 10 Minutes

[@pfh777]

I've always wanted to know simple grammatical structures of Chinese to get a sense of it. This has helped tremendously.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

Great to hear, Peter!

[@ChinaSongsCollection]

@@FluentinMandarinDotCom Hello, could you please do an episode on how to differentiate between : (1) S, SH, and X (2) Z, ZH, and J (3) C, CH, and Q Thanks in advance 🙏

[@silverlining6824]

Errr ... grammar in Mandarin (spoken by the Jing tribal nomads during the Sung dynasty and later as foreign rulers ofChina during the so-called Qing dynasty) is quite different from that of Cantonese (the official language spoken in the “central plains” during the Wei, Sui, and Tang dynasties). For instance “Eat first; talk later” in Mandarin would place the adverb “first” (xian) at the beginning of the sentence, as in “xian chi, zai shuo” whereas in Cantonese “first” (sin) appear almost at the end, as in “sic zo ye sin, coy king”

[@七斤-b5u]

@@ChinaSongsCollection in Sichuan,we don't difference this. all word about ZH SH and CH we use Z S C

[@七斤-b5u]

@@ChinaSongsCollection it is Southwesten mandrin

[@shelleyl8262]

native Chinese here, your pronunciation is even better than some local people lol.

[@ajayrall]

Hi Kaleidoscope_, you are fluent in Chinese Mandarin, right? If it is okay with you, do you think you could help me with a very short Mandarin lyric and English translation, please? I would really appreciate it :D

[@nhinguyenthiyen6774]

His pronunciation is very good

[@brighthorse6981]

@@ajayrall I am Chinese,maybe I can help you too

[@the-bruh.cum5]

Chinese pronounation is hard bro

[@frontlinefromage9503]

@@the-bruh.cum5 actually for a a guy that speaks German and french not as bad ;)

[@xinju8752]

I think your Chinese is so good that your pronunciation sounds really like a Chinese native speaker.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+巨鑫 Thanks!

[@niviamaeva]

maybe he was borne there..

[@traderjoas]

Jacky Phantom what do you mean? it has an extremely strict structure.

[@danthonyem3420]

Jacky Phantom whether easier or harder that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have any.

[@term_in8tor738]

你好

[@lenabeck2603]

why did it take me sooo long to notice he was in the corner

[@clover4135]

SAME

[@elysium5726]

Ikr

[@sophinerokovinuo9199]

Same here....i saw him only toward the end of the video...heee

[@pingoleonfernandez7638]

Spellbound by the characters

[@myckeee]

This was funny. Probably unintentionally funny haha

[@editsonimovie8681]

I love how you have the characters, the pinying, the English with Chinese grammar, and Normal English, thx

[@editsonimovie8681]

@Jerry oop

[@nawang9620]

Your pronunciation is so good. Sounds very beautiful and pleasant.

[@locpham484]

Your pronunciation is real good actually. Got impressed by your very first words, I bet u love this language a lot and kind of get it flow in your blood to be pronoucing that well. Love love

[@originalmisstee]

I have a Chinese midterm tomorrow and this was SO HELPFUL as I haven't had much time to study or dedicate time to learning. Thank you so much!!! Your pronunciation is amazing also.

[@pau749]

Mandarin or Cantonese?

[@1Ren1KouSu]

@@pau749 Mandarin

[@shredderspencer1122]

You have an exactly perfect Mandarin pronunciation.

[@laura2089]

Clear, straight to the point explanation. This is exactly what I've been looking for ❤️

[@sidguernsey1393]

Mandarin is closer to computer language than English in its structure, fascinating, an ordered logic. Great video

[@Nilguiri]

I thought that "de" was always 的 (1:20) but I notice that you have used 3 different characters, at 7:12 you have 地 and at 7:47 you have 得. Is it simply that 的 is to make an adjective, 地 makes an adverb, and 得 is for attributes of a verb? Can you explain a bit more about the difference between the last two (地, 得) as their usage seems similar? Thanks, Chris.

[@goustune]

+Nilguiri I would like to know that too

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Nilguiri 的 得 and 地 are all pronounced 'de'. 地 comes after an adjective to make it an adverb, 得 comes after a verb to introduce the manner or a attribute to the verb, and 的 is sometimes used with adjectives, but can do other things too (it indicates the relationship between two parts of a sentence)

[@Nilguiri]

Fluent in Mandarin.com OK, thanks. I more or less understand, but I need to see some examples for it to fully sink in, I think. Cheers.

[@mrtsiqsin2290]

+Nilguiri This is a big problem in Mandarin which makes even the native speakers very confused about when to use which one. However, these three words are pronounced differently in most other Chinese languages. This tells one of the disadvantages in Mandarin.

[@Nilguiri]

MrTsiqsin Thanks.

[@EduardQualls]

@5:28 *The past tense of "sing" is "sang" not "sung."* ("Sung" is the past participle.)

[@ufoproductions6089]

This guy steam rolls over the pronunciation. Even native speakers don’t sound this good.

[@komlat253]

I think people say their is no grammar because in spoken china ,its more about understanding the context then the order .the ordee just helps u follow along. Im not a expect in Chinese but living in China, people are very lazy speakers and they will put words anywhere as long as its understandable ..like i was taught to always put times 1st or after the pronoun with no exception but i came to china and hurt it so much ..also when i start learning alot of useful phrases, u relize alot of them can be used and alot of different situations. Which to me is the reason i thought Chinese was more of a contextual language then a grammatical one .i told this to some of my Chinese friends, they actually agreed but my Chinese friends are not that smart tho lol sooo yea.

[@dinahnicest6525]

I have said some really silly things in my abuse of Mandarin because I learned mainly from books where I don't hear or remember the tones. I once thought I suggested to someone to bring three of something. She came back with an umbrella. I said "san" but I used the third tone instead of the first. Before my first trip to China, several Chinese friends helped me learn the language. One day someone asked "What did you learn today?" I said what I thought meant "My head is full." He gave me a funny look. So I said it in English, and he laughed because what I really said was "I stole a bag." I said "Wo tou bao le." Bad grammar and wrong tones.

[@derrickt842]

Really impressed with your Chinese. Your pronunciation and accents are even better than many natives.

[@evasco1979]

Thank you for this video, it was really helpful. One about "le", "guo", "ne" and "zhe" would be very helpful too :)

[@languagelover747]

Very helpful video! My only suggestion would be to add traditional character under the simplified ones for those of us learning traditional.

[@jyy4751]

Traditional characters are so complicated

[@s_spiritstar]

@@jyy4751 they are, but some of us learn them. I do cuz I also speak Cantonese

[@arijitpalit2756]

Bruh Chinese just took the sound a cat makes and made it the word for cat. True ingenuity at work there.

[@christophercrick3238]

Great video - VERY helpful. (BTW - shouldn't it be "sang" past tense of "sing"? )

[@alexrafe2590]

Hi Chris, thank you very much for the lesson. It was fascinating seeing that little window into Chinese. I’ve thought about trying to learn Chinese from time to time. I hope you won’t mind if I point out a minor mistake in your use of the past tense with the verb sing. The simple past form for sing is sang. Sung, is the perfect form, so for example, ‘I have sung Chinese songs’.

[@hana_yori_dango]

Thank you!!!

[@danielrodriguezperez8655]

Wow, amazing. I've been studying it for some months but I have been taught almost nothing about the grammatical structure of the language so I didn't understand very well the sentences, specially how to analyze or making them. Thank you a lot!!!!!!

[@carmenthue-tun7512]

I highly appreciate your lessons based on the structure of the sentence. Very good ! Thank you a lot 👍👍👍

[@AndrewFerrer3d]

The most interesting thing I found about Chinese grammar is the splitting of some verbs, called separable verb, for example; "我要跑一个小时步 我睡一个小时觉" Which literally translates to, running, "I'm going run- for one our ning" or, sleeping, "I am slee for one hour -ping "

[@jesseyang8172]

The second character of both words are actually nouns themselves, so it’s more like “I’m going to run one hour of steps” and “I’ll sleep one hour of sleeping”.

[@sunflower553]

I don't know how to explain the situation like this haha，That's a flexible way of saying it，you can say：“我要跑步一小时” and the second sentenses, I can't distinguish the tenses , so sorry , if the past tenses:”我睡了一个小时“ do not need "觉” or future tenses :“我要睡一个小时”

[@jyy4751]

I’m Chinese. You taught very well.

[@Ισαβέλα-ψ7τ]

哈哈哈哈。我不中国人。 我在学习

[@iamintaiwan]

Apart from that, I love this lesson. The guy speaks so clearly, great accent, and the sentences are clear and easy to remember.

[@shrimpleypibbles2509]

Excellent video my man. I'm going to watch your other mandarin lessons. It's helpful to have the patterns of the language all laid out and explained by a native english speaker, rather than random phrases being yelled through my speakers like most videos.

[@kevinbyrne4538]

5:31 -- The past tense of "sing" is "sang". "Sung" is the perfect form of "sing": "He has often sung that song."

[@junsorchids300]

A useful and succinct introduction to Chinese grammar. Just a small question. Shouldn't it be "I sang yesterday" and "I sang for 20 minutes"?

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Jianjun Chen sang and sung are both right

[@mrtsiqsin2290]

+Fluent in Mandarin.com Are you sure? I have never heard that 'sung' can be used as the past tense.

[@junsorchids300]

That‘s exactly what I was saying.

[@senshtatulo]

"Sung" as past tense is considered non- or substandard.

[@JustinG1057]

There is more than one dialect of English. www.verbix.com/webverbix/English/sing.html

[@nhinguyenthiyen6774]

Im Vietnamese. Im learning Chinese. I like this video so much

[@tschibasch]

Your pronunciation is excellent. Bravo!

[@hepsima]

i dont really use 着 myself, how does it work with verbs. Just a present tense right?

[@christopherinman6833]

I have stopped the video to ask where you are from; the last time I saw 'sung' for the English simple past was in reading Jane Austen! Very helpful video, by the way. Thank you.

[@learnurduwithsara1068]

This is great. Your explainations are simple and effective.

[@陈逸-j3n]

very useful！ even for a native speaker!

[@Ισαβέλα-ψ7τ]

是的

[@moybra]

你是一位非常好的老师

[@robertschlesinger1342]

Excellent video. Very interesting, informative, useful and worthwhile video.

[@richardbranche8873]

Thanks for your simple easy chinese lesson

[@dovahkiinmozarteus4957]

Impressive for a native-English speaker. Most native-English speakers are so careless about other languages. You are an exception.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

Thanks Richard!

[@londonbustourview]

他昨天唱歌了may appear as if it meant He sung/sang yesterday, but what 了has brought to the sentance is not past tense, because we don't need tense to express what happended in the past, present or future, 昨天 does the trick very well already, why waste 了 for that? You see, 了 here is not for past tense. 我走了. is I am going, not I went. 我不去了, I am not going, not I did not go. 他昨天唱歌时嗓子有点哑。His throat was a bit sore when he sang yesterday. there is no need for 了, though 他昨天唱歌累了。 He is/was tired singing yesterday. Is or Was does not matter, being tired is the thing, 了 goes with that, not the act of singing, be it in the past or present or future. 他要是再唱就不行了。If he goes on singing, he /it will not be alright. 他昨天唱歌唱得很好。He sang (song) yesterday and he sang very well. there is not need for 了

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+AIUUIO KING You're right, but this was a short video and it's designed to be a simple introduction. The reality is more subtle, but I didn't want to overcomplicate things

[@londonbustourview]

+David Williams The message I am trying to convey is that 了 has nothing to do with past tense which is very hard (or impossible?)to break away from the habitual thinking or logic people are so familiar hence contitioned to, so that there must be a past tense or any tense in a language. It's certainly not the case with Chinese, unfortunatey. In addition, the following expressions are good to take heed 我要走了 i am going to go now 我走了 I am going /leaving but 我不要去了 is an unclear expression. pay attention that it comes more from Chinese language learners than native speakers, Usually To say I don't want to go now， is 我不想去了 To say I am not going now, is 我不去了 to say I want to go, is 我想去 to say i want to go now ( whereas before I was now thinking to go) 我想去了 When you want to say don't do something, you use 不要, say 不要大声喧哗 ，or 不要不听老师的话， but I don't want (to do) something. is 我不想要, 我不想去

[@londonbustourview]

Yes, the likelihood for the 2 phrases to appear in normal conversation by native speakers is possible, though rare in a sense, but the fact is that there is an apparent disregard for tense by the measure impulse present in the minds of the speakers of languages in which tense matters. Even the more often/common used expression is 你学习汉语（学了）多长时间了？even though了s are used in or to their fullest extend, twice in one sentence, but you should notice in this case, that了is not with the main verb, i.e. it is not correct at all grammatically to say 你学习了汉语(学了)多长时间了? If了does not go with the main verb to constitute a tense, the apparent past tense we found somehow in some sense in the sentence here might be true, but the effort to link the presumed target了to that past tense hunt is surely mistaken. 了must be doing something else other than tense here. I can not think of better example so far to explain away the non-connection between了and past tense, though了 does indicate the completion of an action, (but not only that though).

[@erichbaumeister4648]

The word order with the Subjekt at the beginning and the verb at the end with various other elements between is *immediately* recognizable to German speakers, as that is *exactly* our word order, albeit only in subordinate clauses. P.S.: I don't want to nitpick such an excellent video, but the simple past tense of "sing" is "sang," not "sung." That's the past participle

[@a_flower_in_the_forest]

Your Chinese accent is a music to my ears 😍 I used to watch a lot of c-dramas, you sound like someone from there:)

[@warriorspeace_kat4099]

Ohh... ok! I've always wondered why I use ma at the end. Thank you!

[@ChineseJourney]

我快乐地看你的课。谢谢

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

不用谢！

[@milkycloud.]

A VIDEO I NEEDED SO BADLY TT THANK YOU SO MUCH! AND YOUR PRONUNCIATION IS ABSOLUTELY ON POINT!

[@jesuisravi]

you sound like you were raised in China or Taiwan.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+jesuisravi Haha thanks

[@karmafairy351]

Actually judging from his accent...he obviously learned his Mandarin in mainland China and not Taiwan.

[@口折]

@@karmafairy351 yes

[@沈一茗]

actually taiwan is one of province in China

[@jesuisravi]

@@沈一茗 no

[@creative-name5279]

I like that all you have to do to change the tense of something is put a character at the end. Very simple. I also noticed that "de" approximately means "of" in English, but there are different characters used to express "of" depending on context. The only question I have is in the last example. When he says "I sing well", why must he say "sing" twice? Wouldn't once be sufficient? I also noticed that when I typed "flame" into google translate. It came out as "火焰", but couldn't "火" be sufficient enough to express the idea of flame? Why does Chinese repeat ideas twice? If "flame" is considered a more serious problem than "fire", then couldn't it be written as "大火"? Do most Chinese adhere to the repetition rule, or do they do the same thing that I just did?

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

Kind of, but it's not quite as simple as 'adding a character' in all cases. Most 'words' in modern Chinese are made up of two characters, this is how the language has evolved.

[@chengyanslc]

We do use "火” more much frequently than "火焰”(and this has a more formal vibe). But we also tend to use two-character words in modern Chinese compare to single character words in classical Chinese, in order to, among other things, reduce phonetic ambiguities.

[@adamclark1972uk]

Yes. de equates to of. I think it comes from French.

[@dandelion4816]

For the singing part, it's because when you use 得 you must put it just after a verb. In this example the verb is only 唱 while 歌 is a noun as the object. Therefore if you want to link a descriptive term to the end of the sentence 他唱歌 using 得, the verb 唱 must be repeated to ensure 得 is placed next to the verb consecutively.

[@ms-r2972]

火 就火 ，而火焰 说的是燃烧火在时跳动的光影，典型的例子是比如一大堆木头点燃之后火很大，火焰就会很高。

[@SilverC3ll]

Can you say: "Wo hui yao change" to imply you will sing in an indefinite future, without the precision of needing to say exactly when (foregoing "mingtian") . Keep up the good work, brother.

[@saxmaniac6321]

Nice! I usually go to 中欧人来时 on KZbin. Your explanation, however, is much more simple to understand. I’ve been paying for weekly online lessons from Beijing and, more recently, my teacher has also become my language exchange - 完美 🤩🎷

[@LadyHermes]

It was very clear and understandable, even if I didn't know anything about chinese language before coming here. You're a good teacher.

[@zhuotianlin2413]

Thank you Chris. This is a super helpful channel for me even as a native Chinese speaker. Cheers!

[@tekootianderson]

sung is the irregular verb (usually passive) while sang is past tense.

[@L-mo]

Yes. Sung is the past participle and must always be followed by the auxiliary verb (to be). So, I have sung this song before (present perfect tense). I sang it on your wedding day (past simple tense). It’s also used in the passive voice like you said - this song was sung by you.

[@Xesxs]

It's funny you picked these sentences as I am living with many black cats here, and I am a singer so my first Manderin was about these subjects. Thanks for the grammer lessons it helped me tremendously, still can't fix my southern accent. ( Xingxang city)

[@sailor67duilio27]

questions are like the japanese construction, when asking questions at the end of the word one adds ka...wakaremaska?

[@eddewan307]

A small correction: In English, you would say "I sang yesterday", not "I sung yesterday". "sung" is used in a different way: "In the past, I have sung for my supper many times"

[@Alom2007]

Very nice presentation Thanks from Bangladesh.

[@waebloyluv1711]

I just started working at a boba shop and decided to try to learn a bit of Chinese since all the other workers are Chinese. Maybe i will be able to understand some words they are saying hehe this video is very clearly explaining everything, it already helped me a bit to get a general view of the language XD thank you!

[@arcenioarchibold6459]

Hello! thank you! Simple past sang or sung

[@lalamala117]

These video id very important form to improve my chinese language. thank so much!

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+lala mala glad you like the videos!

[@marcoruvel3296]

With your videos I can practice two languages at the same time, I'm Venezuela.

[@mohammedalrashed1132]

Excellent. Thank you. Very helpful 👌

[@healthnets]

An extremely helpful video. Thanks. Mark Davis MD

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Mark Davis glad it helped you Mark!

[@term_in8tor738]

I know some but not a lot thanks for this 谢谢老师 ！

[@LR-hu2pj]

is "de" like japanese "no"? like, used to connect an adjective to a noun?

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

I don't know Japanese, but yes, in one of its uses it works like that, so there are some similarities

[@bloody_tea3924]

Don’t know the Japanese grammar, but sort of. In Chinese language,the word 的de is part of Chinese adjective. For example, the word 重要的important or 美味的delicious, with 的de it’s adjective, without 的de it’s noun.

[@mattice9083]

yeah pretty similar. thats how i clicked the light bulb on that point. nihon no hon, and its also similiar to -na verbs in kirei na kanojo

[@yx214]

Yes, very similar. And in fact, in some time on the Chinese internet, Japanese “no” is used instead of Chinese “de” in a simple word or sentence (to my understanding, it’s usually for making the sentence more “cute”). So Japanese “no” might be the most well-known Japanese character for Chinese.

[@bonbonpony]

@@mattice9083 Could it be also understood as genitive case? (kinda like the English 's or "of")

[@MariaOrtiz-zj8zn]

you've been of so much help. thank you so much

[@trommelbiel]

You are a good teacher. Keep up the good work.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+k odu thanks!

[@meowiiyuzu]

this helps me a lot for a beginner like me, thank you

[@fear_less_2020]

Lovely video! Simple to understand and your pronunciation is on point!

[@maryellencervantes1332]

Thanks, for demystifying Chinese sentence word order. I will definitely check out your website!

[@neoultra6528]

"de" is seemingly like "no" in japanese. So it's basically "type of".

[@nmkrios6551]

Awesome video. I've wanted to learn Chinese for a while, but I'd always postpone it. I kept watching this video just to get a taste of the language, and now I decided to start learning it! I have one question regarding the pronunciation. I started to realize that mine is a bit unnatural compared to people who know how to speak Chinese. For example, the sentence at 1:17 - after the "sè", the flow of your pronunciation changed, it was a bit faster than before, right? Same at 4:20, after "péngyǒu". Is there a rule to it? Hope you can help me with this. Thank you!

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

I think it's because the syllable after the 'se' was unstressed. It is also related to the 'four tones' in Chinese. Some of tones are longer then the others, maybe you can check out my video on the tones for some more information about this.

[@yizhang7027]

There's actually a fifth tone in Mandarin Chinese. Unstressed characters use the fifth tone: Neutral tone. In the video, the de at 1:17 and you at 4:20 are both unstressed. For two-character words, sometime the second character is unstressed, but I don't know if there is consistent rule about this.

[@Kolvatn]

i wish duolingo had a such good voice as you do. i wqould have learned even better.

[@RNGD-jp7nk]

You are a fantastic teacher. Thanks a ton.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

You're welcome!~

[@Rorohaz12]

谢谢你。I like your pronunciation in Chinese .. and the grammar was very helpful to me 💖💖

[@sajidmushfikrahman4085]

Is it like Sub+Time+place+verb order+(Past/future signs) the correct order? Sub+adverb+marker+verb

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

That's the basic word order yes

[@jaredcurtis1955]

Great video, thanks! How did you learn Chinese?

[@窗橱]

你好 ，你可以多听 多阅读

[@CalanYes]

I'm learning English now and I'm a Chinese people

[@rev3160]

Internationale Yes! Good luck brother

[@CalanYes]

Revilo thank you

[@sassafrasofficial3695]

As a student of Japanese, I just got so curious about the language which Japanese got its alphabet from! I always thought Chinese had an effect on the actual grammar of Japanese, but evidently it wasn't a very direct descendant. Japanese is an SOV language, meaning you would say "I sushi like" (僕はおすしがすきですよ) but here he showed that Chinese is SVO like English with "You like cats" (ni xihuan mao - I don't have the right tone accents on my keyboard) Really cool beans

[@dottieshields5918]

Thank you for making this so logical.

[@jacobreed8753]

On the last sentence, why was the adverb after the verb but it wasn't on the previous example??

[@tangsivmey5998]

Can u tell me more about marker to indicate the future sentence?

[@batenerel4813]

hello today i am watched your lesson first time.i realky like your lesson .teacher

[@curtpiazza1688]

Informative lesson.....thanx!

[@barbaralatham5107]

In English the past tense of sing is "sang" not "sung." "Sung" is the past participle. It requires the auxiliary verb "have." I. e. I have sung.

[@adamclark1972uk]

It's really just ignorance. How can people be so ignorant of how their own language works?

[@ICXCTSARSLAVY]

It is used by uneducated or lazy people. This practice of interchanging the past participle and the simple past came from ghetto slang or sometimes hillbillies in the backwoods. This is nothing to be proud of or emulated.

[@renijaviermolinarodriguez933]

Good work! Congratulations! Is there any pdf to learn pinyin Chinese? I really liked it

[@MyRockMyFortress]

Your Chinese pronunciation is way better than I. I am from southern China.

[@raftaarinho3521]

This simply awesome, incredibly well explained!!! Thank you so very much, TEACHER!

[@ValleyData]

You did great on this. I actually sing everyday and this was very useful.

[@kahea2018]

This is great. Thank you. I wish I had a video like this at the beginning of my Spanish studies lol. I had to figure it out as I went along 😂

[@yunanzhang3660]

Your pronunciation is really good, I thought you are a Chinese before I see your head portrait at the bottom

[@jingruxiong6999]

中文的一大特点是喜欢省略不影响句意的部分，比如“你喜欢黑色的猫”，口语直接简单说就是“你喜欢黑猫。”“你喜欢黑猫还是白猫？” 我感觉在生活口语中大多数人不会一字一句的说黑色的猫，除非是特指。

[@inthenebula92]

This was very helpful! I love C-dramas and I've picked up some words/phrases/characters, but I'd get confused by the sentence structure and how it was translated into English.

[@jarreth22]

Really pleasent video, and amazing pronunciation! It is also a good reminder of the first step in Chinese grammar.

[@ffwillow4628]

Ohhhh! Really helpful! Definitely will recommend to my friends who are learning Chinese.

[@Azhucabomb]

This guy’s Chinese is fucking accurate and precise. That’s the most perfect Chinese I’ve ever heard.

[@_id_5829]

You do have a flawless pronunciation

[@GregfromPhilly]

"I sung"? Is this British English? In America, we say: "I sang."

[@GiveMeThatSwordPower]

Sung is a word American English, but it is suppose to be sang.

[@konnen4518]

How’re an American but don’t even know the past participle of sing? Shocking!

[@Blondesax]

I think he's simply misspoken. I can't find any indication that British English uses sung as the simple past version. I'm relatively sure it should still be sang.

[@TheAspiringCentenarian]

I didn't even notice that. Good catch

[@Lawh]

"I had sung" would be a correct use for it. I sang a song, I hadn't sung a song.

[@spiritualflame4]

Thanks for this Chris! I've always had an extremely hard time with sentence structure and grammar, still do. I have a few questions, if that's alright: How do you know what words to pair with each other to form a grammatically correct sentence? For instance, I was talking to my friend who lives in China, and I texted her, "我会电话你," and she told me that it's supposed to be, "我会打电话你." How am I supposed to know that? This is where Chinese stumps me. I spend some time everyday learning characters (albeit slowly, I only know a couple hundred, which is small), but it all feels pointless because I don't know what characters to combine them with, or where in a sentence they should go. Is there a good way to approach this? I tried looking at a detailed guide for sentence structure, but it threw me for a loop.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Jeoffrey Robinson Hi Jeoffrey, the answer for how you know the sentences structures is you learn them by hearing different sentences and chopping and changing words, or from grammar patterns explained in grammar books etc. There are set patterns which you get used to over time. I'm currently working on a book of essential patterns and structures for the Chinese course on my site, because as you say, not many people are concentrating on this. You can also find example sentences in dictionaries and websites such as jukuu.com.

[@spiritualflame4]

Fluent in Mandarin.com Thanks for the reply! I see what you mean though, that it's just something you pick up through active experience. I've been learning individual characters, and then searching up what other characters they are paired up with to make new meanings. It helps me figure out where in a sentence the characters go. Unfortunately, I only know some 300-400 characters, and so I can't really do much. I don't even know how many characters I'm supposed to know. Isn't it like a couple thousand or something?

[@spiritualflame4]

***** Ah, that's really interesting and useful. Thanks! Are there any other instances in which I might use 打?

[@PatchyE]

+Jeoffrey Robinson The only way is to remember the combinations. You cannot know them automatically by applying a fixed rule. They are like "words" in Chinese. You can not speak English without knowing the words. Chinese words are much more easier to remember than English words once you learned the basic characters, so don't feel discouraged. Some examples for common combination with 打: 打折 (to give a discount) 打字 (to type) 打针 (to have an injection) 打车 (to call a texi) 打扮 (to dress up) 打分 (to give somebody a score) 打架 (to fight) 打枪 (to fire a gun) 打牌 (to play cards).

[@spiritualflame4]

Patchy .E. Ah, I see. Thank you! Looks like I got a lot of memorizing to do. ;-;

[@НапФоре]

Mr Chris what about advanced grammar ? Chinese advanced grammar really hard to find on Internet...

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Ni na Aleksandrova try the Chinese grammar wiki

[@JasonMeng]

don't trust wiki. No advanced grammar in Chinese.

[@WCiossek]

The good thing in Chinese is, that this language has nearly no grammar! No conjugation, no declination, words does not change. You can learn directly words from dictionary and put this in a sentences in a special order. That is nearly all. Long sentence are build like this: Who - When - Where - How - making -What. Now you can substitute these words. For Who you can substitude you, I, we etc. For example: Tomorrow I will study with my friend German in the university of Hambug I (who) tomorrow (when) in the university of Hamburg (where) with my friend (how) study (making) German (what) Wo3 yao4 - ming2 tian1- zai han4 bao3 da4 xue2- gen1 wo2 peng2 you3 - xue2 xi2 - de2 wen2 我 要 明 天 在 汉 堡 大 学 跟 我 朋 友 学 习 德 文. 我 wo3 = I, my 要 yao4 = will 明 天 ming2 tian1 = tomorrow 在 zai4 = in (to be in) 汉 堡 han4 bao3 = Hamburg 大 学 da4 xue2 = university 跟 gen1 = with 朋 友 peng2 you3 = friend 学 习 xue2 xi2 = to learn, to study 德 文 de2 wen2 = German language A short sentence which have the same word order like in English or German have to do with this structure above. You can reduce "Who - When - Where - How - making -What." to "How - making - what" I learn German 我 学 习 德 文. I will learn German 我 要 学 习 德 文. Some other special things is in Chinese to use counting words 一 个 人 a piece human 一 本 书 a piece book 这 三 辆 车 this 3 piece vehicles The kind of counting word depend on the for of an object, Everthing, what is countable, must have a counting word.

[@Mike-wj1kg]

Helpful! A note in English if you say this: "Tomorrow I will study with my friend German" it means your friend is called German and you will study with him/her tomorrow! Instead you should say: "Tomorrow I will study German with my friend"

[@sabrina3138]

Ironically, 我要学德文。

[@SeeYou.0107]

WOW! You are SUPER GREAT!!