Elementary Mandarin Chinese Textbook

Learn Chinese step by step with a clear, practical beginner course.

Elementary Mandarin Chinese Textbook is a beginner-friendly course designed to help you learn the basics of Chinese, including speaking, reading and writing. Organized into 24 lessons, it introduces everyday language through practical dialogues and straightforward explanations.

The course can be completed over an academic year or used for self-study at your own pace. Each lesson includes a dialogue, vocabulary, grammar notes, and reading sections, with exercises provided in the companion Elementary Mandarin Chinese Workbook.

Free online audio and video recordings, flash cards, and additional resources support your learning, helping you improve pronunciation and build confidence with real-world Chinese.

This course includes:

• Everyday Chinese dialogues based on real-life situations
• Clear, non-technical grammar explanations
• Vocabulary lists and reading practice in every lesson
• Audio recordings by native Chinese speakers with a range of accents
• Supplementary video clips and learning tools
• A Chinese-English dictionary and downloadable flash cards

Chinese characters and Pinyin are used throughout (except in reading exercises), so you can focus on spoken Mandarin, reading and writing, or both. For best results, use this book alongside the Elementary Mandarin Chinese Workbook and the included audio materials available from Tuttle.

Cornelius C. Kubler is Stanfield Professor of Asian Studies at Williams College and a former Language Training Supervisor at the U.S. Department of State's Foreign Service Institute. He has taught Chinese for decades and is the author or coauthor of numerous books on Chinese language learning and linguistics.