I am a student studying how to teach Chinese as a foreign language. A few months before, a guy ask me to tell him something about Chinese grammer, I tried, but it seemed not work.
When I was learning Chinese grammer, my teacher told me that Chinese grammer is very simple, just sort out the relation of 主谓宾定状补, that`s all. But why foreigners cannot use Chinese well, that`s because they cannot figer out the WORD ORDER and function word.
For example, 这本书我看了三天。& 这本书我看了三天了。The second one seems just get a 了 more than the first one, but the meaning is totally different. (1st:I finished reading this book in three days. 2nd:I have read this book for three days but Ihaven`t finish this book yet.)
So, in my mind, compared with grammer, keep more words and typical sentenses and try to use it is more important.
Do you think Chinese grammer important or not??? Why???
When you learning your mother tongue ,you will consider grammar as the first thing ? I think the important thing is language environment and often communicate with people . I hope my answer will help you ^^
Hi Siwing! As a native Chinese and also a Chinese teacher, I'd like to share my opinion with you. I do think grammar is important.
First let's figure out, what is grammar? Grammar is the set of rules that explain how words are used in a language. With grammar, we can use limited vocabulary to mean various things, right? I think when you teacher told you that the Chinese grammar is very simple, he or she just didn't want to make the students feel much pressure. Especially for the starters, the teachers prefer to make things easy and simple, so that the students will have the confidence to go on learning. But when you move to a higher level, and you need to express your meaning more percisely, of cause you need to master the various grammar.
When you say "keep more words and typical sentenses and try to use it is more important", I partly agree. Typical sentences will be usefull and in my opinion it's a good way to learn grammar. Vocabulary is a necessity but I've seen some intermediate students using various words without the right grammar and this make me spend much time on guessing their meaning.
That's all what I want to say to you. By the way, what questiones did the guy ask you?
no, i dont think it is important. when i am talking to someone else, there are always mistakes, but the listener can understand me. however, if it is in very important occasion, you should know it well.
