The best Chinese study resources – Chinese Language & Culture

Content extracted from http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/8195-best-of-chinese-study-tools-studying-chinese-online-and-off/

A “short list” of the best Chinese study resources available to help those new to online/electronic resources to get off the ground.

DictionariesOnline Reading Assistant (instant pinyin and definition while you browse)

Online Dictionaries

- YellowBridge Chinese English Dictionary
- ChinesePod Dictionary (sentences w/ recordings)
- Dict.cn Dictionary, English/Chinese searchable dictionary with many example sentences in English and Chinese.
- Xiaoma Cidian is a dictionary searchable by English, Character and Pinyin, and also has links to other helpful word lists. [S]
- MDBG Dictionary is an all-around dictionary
- Guoyu Dictionary, commercial-level traditional Chinese-based dictionary maintained by Taiwan Department of Education, with large number of word entries and detailed definitions.
- Classical Chinese Dictionary (A) [T]
- Specialized Chinese Dictionaries [S]
- Zhongwen.com, good radical/stem derivation diagrams fro exploring the relationship between characters (in traditional character)
Online Dictionaries that support screen (mouse) character writing
- nciku.com – a new tool based on UniHan
- A Java tool from Chinese-Tools.com
Offline (instant pinyin and definition for offline text reading)
- Dimsum (provides pop-up definition for both websites and offline texts; uses Java, should run on PC/Mac/and more)
- PlecoDict (Palm/PocketPC; US$99.95 for version with John deFrancis’s excellent ABC dictionary, allows for a instant definition while reading on your PDA – works the best with TealDoc on Palm; excellent full-featured flashcard system). See discussion.
- Wakan Free mouse-over pop-up dictionary for all windows applications.
- Wenlin, US$199, with academic discounts possible; PC/Mac; includes the ABC dictionary; provides mouse-over pinyin and definitions and unique features such as one-click searches for all characters containing a component or all phrases containing a character. (G) [S,T]
- NJStar (mainly a word processor, but version 5.0 also has a teaching mode which provides pop-up definitions and automated vocabulary list generator; demo version is fully functional, but need to pay for registration for all features, including the full dictionary)
- HanConv: converts between Chinese characters to pinyin and romanized Cantonese, and convert between Simplified and Traditional Chinese characters
- Puku: converts between Chinese character to pinyin on Microsoft Pocket PC. Freeware made by a non-profit Putonghua advocate group.
- Powerword: The most commonly used pop-up translator software in China. More geared towards native Chinese speakers learning English but is perhaps the most efficient Chinese-English mouse-over translator combined with a user-created CEDICT dictionary add-on found here.
- For more on electronic dictionaries, see this discussion and this.
- For more on mouse-over/pop-up dictionaries, see this discussion.
- PABLO (Windows): Freeware Chinese-English dictionary, with handwriting recognition, stroke animations and great search features.
Test Preparation
- Popup Chinese – sample HSK test exercises at three levels of difficulty (beginner, intermediate, advanced).Tones[list]
- SpeakGoodChinese (program for training tone pronunciation, see discussion)
- Start from Pinyin: Alphabet of Pinyin (with .wav audio)
- Mandarin Chinese Pronunciation Guide (no audio)
- Pinyin Practice (
- Romanization Explained
- Pinyin Wiki
- More here…
Grammar
- ChinesePod (grammar guide, or podcasts with grammar points).
Chinese Usage Dictionary.

Listening Material

Popup Chinese – free podcast lessons, HSK tests and annotated texts and transcripts with mouseover popups. Focus on standard Beijing dialect.
Chinese as a Second Language Podcasts.
Podcast with free transcripts from Nankai University.
Chinese Voices, collection of short, engaging mini-essays with accompanying audio for intermediate students.
CCTV Travel in Chinese (teaches you Chinese with a travel theme; transcript available on website). See this discussion.
CCTV’s “Economics Half Hour” 《经济半小时》: videos (click on the little icon after the titles) and transcripts of many shows are available on the site. A little like a more commercialized version of “60 Minutes.” The show covers many subjects, not just the economy, despite its name.
ChinesePod.com
China Radio International beginning Chinese listening materials (with pinyin and English transcripts). See discussion.
Chinese subtitles/script for Chinese movies (for movies that you may have downloaded from lib.verycd.com). See discussion.
Online audio lessons (I)
Chinese Radio Online
Chinese Television Online
Radio Free Asia
ChinesePod (learning community & podcasts)
More listening resources: see this discussion.

Reading Material

Chinese Text Sampler (texts graded by difficulty level) (linked through anonymouse.org due to site being blocked by the Great Firewall)
NewsInChinese.com
Collection of writings by famous modern authors such as Lu Xun, Su Tong, and Wang Xiaobo

Flashcards/Vocabulary

Software
- jMemorize, Supermemo-like flashcard system that keeps track of your study history
- MyChineseFlashCards: nice open-source Chinese flashcard program (Mac, PC, Linux)
- See PlecoDict above
- Zhongwen Development Tool, java-based cross platform (Windows, Mac, Linux). Open Source.
- PINGRID (Windows): Freeware vocabulary training game. Based on spaced repetitions and 100% geared towards Chinese vocabulary.
Specific Flashcards

Study Tools

Hanyu College: Animated dialogues, karaoke, radio, and advanced readings (B,I,A) [S]
DimSum: offline reading tool with annotation, dictionary (I,A) [S,T]
University of Oxford Multi-Media Language Course (B,I)
Read Mandarin – Learn to Read Chinese : Very useful website created by Daniel for learning characters (B, +pronunciation audio files) [S]

Converters

Language Partners

Find a Chinese chat partner with QQ (a popular instant message program in China). See discussion.
Meet Language Partners Online
LangEx
Sharedtalk.com

Games

Other

Mandarin Slang (Wikipedia)
Mandarin-Cantonese Term Converter
Hanzismatter exposes the misuse of Chinese characters
Signese exposes characters in action