Mandarin Chinese Textbooks
怎么选学习中文的课本？可能很多同学买书的时候只看话题实不实用。话题实用当然重要，但是从我的角度来看，我觉得系统性的设计更重要，特别是中文的句子结构要循序渐进。你不可能只靠一套教程就学完所有的话题，而是要用一套科学的教程作为主线，搭建自己的语法和句子结构体系，这样以后不管用什么材料学习什么话题，都更容易的理解和吸收。
How do you select a Chinese textbook? Many students tend to focus solely on whether the topics are practical. While practicality is important, a systematic design is even more crucial, especially regarding the gradual progression of Chinese sentence structures. You can’t just rely on a set of textbooks to learn all the topics. Instead, we should use textbooks as the main line, building a grammar and sentence structure system. So that no matter what other materials and topics we learn, it’ll be easier to understand and learn.
过去的十四年，我用得最多的课本和资料都是北京语言大学出版社出版的，其中《HSK标准教程》和《新实用汉语课本》我都用了十年以上。正好北京语言大学出版社海外商城ChinoEasy的颜老师发现了我的Instagram账号，给我发来邮件。他们希望我把这套教程推荐给更多的汉语学习者。
Over the past 14 years, the textbooks and materials I have used most were published by Beijing Language and Culture University Press. I’ve used the HSK Standard Course and the New Practical Chinese Reader for over ten years. Ms. Yan from ChinoEasy, the overseas store of Beijing Language and Culture University Press, found my Instagram account and emailed me. She would like me to recommend these textbooks to more Chinese language learners.
《HSK标准教程》HSK Standard Course
《HSK标准教程》是我使用最多的一套教程，已经用了近十年了。一方面是北京语言大学的老师经验丰富，能够循序渐进的编写语法和其它知识点。另一方面，这套教程对那些想参加汉语水平考试(HSK)的同学来说也更方便。
HSK Standard Course is the textbook I’ve been using for nearly ten years. On the one hand, teachers from Beijing Language and Culture University are experienced and can write grammar and other knowledge points step by step. On the other hand, this textbook is also more convenient for students who want to take the HSK exam.
《新实用汉语课本》New Practical Chinese Reader
《新实用汉语课本》是我入行使用的第一本课本，也是使用时间最长的一本课本。说来也巧，我2010年开始做国际中文老师，北京语言大学出版社也是2010发行了这套课本的第一版。后来改进到了第二版和第三版，我们也沿用到了现在。
这套课本最吸引我的有三点：
- 话题和知识点都覆盖全面。有日常话题，也有中国文化相关话题。
- 课后的练习总结了固定搭配词组，也有句型替换练习，我觉得这对外语学习是至关重要的一部。
- 难度循序渐进。第一本课本有拼音，每篇课文之后都用图片演示基础汉字，也列出了汉字的正确书写顺序。第二本课文则只标明声调，没有给出拼音字母。这对帮助学生逐步摆脱对拼音的依赖，通过回忆练习阅读汉字很有帮助。
New Practical Chinese Reader was the first textbook I used when I started teaching Chinese, and it is also the textbook I have used the longest. It’s also a coincidence that I began to teach foreigners Chinese in 2010, and Beijing Language University and Culture University Press also released the first edition of this textbook in 2010. It has since been improved to the second and third editions, and we have continued to use it until now.
These are three things that attracted me most about this textbook:
First, it covers a wide range of topics and knowledge points. It includes daily issues as well as topics related to Chinese culture.
Second, the exercises after each lesson summarize fixed phrase combinations and have sentence structure replacement exercises, which I think are crucial for foreign language learning.
Third, the difficulty level increases gradually. The first textbook has pinyin, and after each lesson, some pictures demonstrate basic Chinese characters and the correct order of writing the characters is also listed. The second textbook only marks the tones and does not give the pinyin letters. This is very helpful for helping students gradually get rid of their dependence on pinyin and practice reading Chinese characters by recalling them.
《轻松学中文》Easy Steps to Chinese-- English & Spanish Version
刚教外国人中文的几年，我的大部分学生都是成人。偶尔有几个孩子的学生，我也是临时根据学生的情况自己编写学习材料。最近几年孩子的学生越来越多，而且一些十岁左右的学生在见到我的时候中文已经很不错，1个小时的课下来我们几乎全都可以用中文交流。而且他们的基础非常好，句子结构基本上没什么问题，大部分孩子也都能认识一些基础汉字。好几个孩子以前在学校都使用《轻松学中文》这部教程。
这让我对这套教程产生了兴趣。后来一看才知道这套教程是专门为非母语国家的孩子设计的。不但针对不同年龄的孩子设计了少儿版和青少年版，还邀请了经验丰富的西班牙语为母语的老师一共编撰了西语版。
In the first few years of teaching Chinese, most of my students were adults. Occasionally, there were a few children students, and I just wrote materials for them. In recent years, however, the number of children students has been increasing, and some teenage students have already developed quite good Chinese when they meet me. In our 1-hour Chinese lesson, they can almost communicate in Chinese. Their foundation is pretty good, and their sentence structures nearly have no problems. Most of the children can also read and write some Chinese characters. Several of them have used Easy Steps to Chinese.
It has sparked my interest in this textbook. Later, I found this book was designed for children from non-native Chinese-speaking countries. Not only was there a Kids version and a teenage version for different ages, but it also invited experienced Spanish-speaking teachers to co-author the Spanish version.
虽然我有不少说西班牙语的学生，但是我们一直用的是英文版课本。主要是因为很多别的语言的汉语课本都没有英文的好，那些语言的解释和翻译常常是混乱的。
刚收到北京语言大学大学海外线上商城颜老师寄来的西班牙语课本《新思维汉语》，这刷新了我对别的语种中文课本的认识。《新思维汉语》从立项、编写到成书的整个过程，都是找的西语母语者中知名汉学家及汉语教师参与编写的，不像其它的中西双语教材都是从中英版本翻译过去的，加上作者本身也是在古巴、乌拉圭和西班牙从事过逾15年的海外教学工作，因此这套教材极其适合西语母语者学习。同时为了更好的解决初学者面临的挑战，他们还基于该教材组织了几位西语母语者汉语教师录制了配套的课程。
Although I have many Spanish-speaking students, we have always used English textbooks. The main reason is that many other language versions of Chinese textbooks are not as good as the English ones, and the explanations and translations in those versions are often confusing.
I just received the Spanish textbook “NUEVA DIDÁCTICA DE LA LENGUA CHINA PARA HISPANOHABLANTES” from Ms.Yan at the Beijing Language and Culture University Press, which has changed my perception of Chinese books in other languages. The entire process of projecting, writing, and publishing “NUEVA DIDÁCTICA DE LA LENGUA CHINA PARA HISPANOHABLANTES” was done with the participation of well-known Sinologists and Chinese teachers who are native speakers of Spanish, unlike other bilingual Chinese-Spanish textbooks that were translated from English versions. Additionally, the author Ms. Li had over 15 years of overseas teaching experience in Cuba, Uruguay, and Spain, so this textbook is suitable for Spanish native speakers to learn Chinese. To better solve the beginners’ problems, they also arranged for Spanish-speaking Chinese teachers to record supplementary courses based on this textbook.
Ten Most Important Sentence Structures for learning Mandarin Chinese
This book is for Elementary Chinese learners who speak English. Over 95% of the vocabulary and sentence structures are from the new HSK 1-3 (2021 Edition).
Personal suggestion on using textbooks
Here is my experience with using textbooks to learn foreign languages. When we start a new foreign language, it is best to use some popular and classic textbooks. Because such textbooks are written by professional teachers, learning basic language knowledge will be more systematic and advantageous for building a good language foundation. It will also allow you to see your progress step by step, building your confidence in learning the language. However, when you reach an intermediate level, I suggest you can’t just rely on a set of textbooks. Instead, we should use textbooks as the main line, at the same time, we should also read and listen to other materials for native Chinese speakers.