Mandarin Chinese

Mandarin Chinese is a language from China. More than one billion people speak it. It is the main language of China and Taiwan. People also speak it in Singapore and other places. Mandarin uses special symbols called characters instead of letters.

How It Sounds

Mandarin is a tonal language. That means the same word can have different meanings based on how you say it. There are four main tones. One tone is flat. One goes up. One goes down and up. One goes down. The word 'ma' can mean mother, horse, hemp, or scold. It all depends on the tone you use.

Writing Mandarin

Mandarin does not use an alphabet like English. It uses characters. Each character stands for a word or idea. There are thousands of characters. Kids in China learn them in school. To help people learn, there is also a system called Pinyin. Pinyin uses English letters to show how to say the words.

Fun Facts

• Mandarin has over one billion speakers, more than any other language.
• Some Chinese characters are thousands of years old.
• The word 'Mandarin' comes from an old word for a Chinese official.

Did You Know?

You need to know about 2,000 to 3,000 characters to read a Chinese newspaper!