Sharing tips about studying Chinese: From typing Chinese characters, to apps used for studying. By Serene Zawaydeh. November 3, 2025
Learning Chinese requires spending a lot of time and effort studying. One must prepare before class and do all required homeworks; must figure out how to study, what tools to use; and need to keep adapting the method of learning. The learning process spans over multiple years. A vast amount of information needs to be learnt from scratch, especially since the language does not have a specific set of Alphabets that make up all words; and a lot of characters share a similar sound, but are written differently. The process of learning Chinese takes years, and not one or two years.
Each country has a specific test center that is authorized to do HSK exams. So you need to contact the official test center to do the exam at the center.
The official website for HSK exams is: https://www.chinesetest.cn/HSK
The language we are learning is Mandarin Chinese, which is used in Mainland China. It is called
普通话，and the Chinese characters are called 汉字. What we are using are the Simplified Chinese Characters, which is 中文（简体）, if you want to look up the translation on an online translator. In Hong Kong and Taiwan, Traditional Chinese Characters are used, and that would be 中文（繁体）， if you want to use the online translator.
To write the character, you should also write it with the right stroke order, and this is why you should first start by practicing writing on paper, following the correct stroke order. Yabla dictionary shows the stroke order for characters.
For getting better handwriting, writing can be done on Chinese writing paper. Following is an example of Chinese writing paper which you can print out to practice.
In HSK1, I was writing each word many times. Starting HSK2, I was writing all the text for the next lesson before each lesson. Recently, it took me one week to write down each sentence of one movie, which was all in Chinese, without translation. This gave me a better understanding of the movie, as I looked up all the words that I did not know, and was able to better understand the details.
To be able to type Chinese, you need to know the pinyin,which you have learnt along with each character or word. If you don't know the pinyin, you can use Pleco dictionary, and you can draw the character on your mobile's screen.
If you write cheng shi and you do not know the way it is written before typing
it, you might choose this character, 诚实 which
means "honest".
If you haven't tried typing Chinese into Microsoft Word, this is how you can do that.
You should add Chinese to your Languages on your computer, under Language
Settings.
Choose Language to install, and install Simplified Chinese, which is used for teaching Mandarin, and is used for teaching 汉语水平考试（HSK） material.
Chinese will be added to your Keyboard Layout among other languages that you
have installed on your computer. I also have Arabic instead, along with
English.
Looking at the bottom right of my screen, I can switch between the
languages that I have installed using Alt+Shift (pressing ALT key then at the same time, pressing SHIFT key), on the left hand side on my keyboard.
By pressing on Alt+Shift, I can toggle between the languages that I have installed. I get ENG;ع for Arabic; and 英 with 拼 for Chinese. 英文 means English, and 拼音 means pinyin. To type English, I have to have ENG, to type Chinese Chinese, I choose 中， which has 中，with 拼 beside it.
Alternatively, I can press on ENG, and then I would choose, 拼 (Simplified, China).
Notice that I should have 中 with 拼 to be able to get the Chinese Characters by typing the pinyin, and not 英 with 拼。
Note that while typing, I use ALT+SHIFT to keep changing from English to Chinese with my left hand and using the left hand side ALT and Shift on the keyboard.
So again, going back to typing Chinese, the method of entering
characters is based on the pinyin, which has to be learnt for each Chinese letter.
With the Language set to 中 which stands for zhong wen, 中文，which means Chinese, I have to write zhong
Several characters are obtained
which are all zhong.
To quickly type what I want, I have to write zhongwen
In order to add the pinyin on top of the word in Microsoft Word, you
need to go to Phonetic Guide. You can find it under Home, and you will see the small Aabc , under Font. This is how you will be able to add the tones
to the Chinese characters that you type, or to the text that you have on your
MS Word.
So pressing with left hand, on the ALT-SHIFT on the left hand sided of
your keyboard; looking on the bottom right of your screen, you will see the
languages being changed. Once you change the 英 sign into 中 sign (which has the 拼 beside it), now you can start typing the Chinese
words that you want to write.
Chengshi
Choose the words that you need. For example 诚实， 城市
Next, to add the pinyin on top of each of the two words, we need to go to the
Phonetic Guide.
城市
城市
诚实
城市
诚实
After typing these two words, we notice the differences
between the two words.
· both 诚 and城 have the same pinyin (cheng) and
it is also the same tone (second tone).
· 城 and 诚 both has the
same component that is 成 which also the same pinyin as both of these characters, and the same tone; but it is written without the left hand side part of the word.
· We notice that the word city starts with the part that is found in 地 which is found in the following words
- 地方place
- 地图 map
- 地址 address
- 地理 geography
- 地铁 subway
Yabla.com - Chinese Dictionary
If we look at the word, 诚，we notice that the left hand part, in Simplified Chinese, which looks like an English “i” is also found it words such as: 语言，说，告诉，诉讼，诚实 , and these words are related to speech or language.
Therefore, 语言is written as語言in Traditional Chinese, instead of 语言.
Chinesimple from Khanji School – Dictionary App
While studying, I have been making my own word lists on Dictionary app from Khanji School, as well. Chinesimple from Khanji School is great for learning and practicing each word on its own, and repeating sentences.
If I don't know the pinyin of a word, the first application that I open up is Pleco, and I write down the word on the mobile phone's screen to find its meaning. I also save expressions that are found as one word on Pleco, such as 可支配收入, which means disposable income, as found on Pleco.
As for studying long text, I use Language Player, which has Reader feature, which I find really useful for studying. The Dictionary has Let ChatGPT explain, which specifically gives the meaning of the word in the text that I am studying. I find this feature very useful, as it gives the required meaning.
On Language Player, I can get all the pinyin for all the words, or just some of the words, and it is possible to show the words without the pinyin, or with the meaning. The pictures also easily illustrate the meaning of the word.
Having all the pinyin is definitely
helpful while practicing reading out loud the text with the correct tones,
which is difficult to know for each and every word, as can be seen in the
screen shot above. We need to know all the pinyin, and the tones, and the words
are not presented with pinyin after HSK2. After HSK level 2, we should be able to read the text without the pinyin.
There are different settings for Reader on Language Player. Having pinyin on every word, or just showing pinyin for the difficult words. It is also possible to have the meaning below the word. It is super helpful to have space between words as shown below, as Chinese paragraphs are usually written without any spaces. Not knowing whether the word consists of one character, or two characters form one word; or three; or four characters, means that the reading will not be quite right. As for having setting up the reader to show all the information, including pinyin on each word, the meaning below the word, it would be too much information to process.
While reading new text, the student might not fully grasp the meaning of a sentence, although they know different words, and don’t know some words. The reason is because combining two characters often gives a specific meaning, and this is learnt by looking up the words and learning vocabulary for the lessons or text. In the above example, we can see the specific meaning for the word 热量. The student might already know that 热 means hot, and 量means quantity. However, when combined together, the word 热量 means “calories”.
While reading text on Language Player, I keep adding the words to Language Player’s
Dictionary.
Language Player has a feature which allows knowing the word for the song
or movie, and it has a big library of videos and songs. It is also possible to import
videos from YouTube and watch them on Language Player. Other features include knowing the differences between words, and getting a large number of videos with specific sentences for each word.
In addition to typing, I also write the whole text for the lesson that I
am studying. I have been doing this since HSK2. Meanwhile, I started writing down the Characters in HSK1, and was writing each word many times.
Other steps that I have done, include stopping the video at every sentence or text that I want to understand; writing each sentence down on paper; then going to the next sentence; looking up the meaning of each word using Pleco; and then typing it all into a document; then looking up the translation of the whole text, to get an understanding of the text. Doing this takes time, but it helps with learning how the word is written, and the word would be repeated several times in the same text. While writing down the text, similarities between words are spotted. As for getting the characters by first taking an image of the text, I have used Yandex for this step. However, I compare the characters that are obtained with the original text, as sometimes there are inaccuracies in character recognition.
To practice pronounciation, I use Chinesimple app for the HSK level that I am studying. I have been using it since HSK1, and I am currently using HSK5 and HSK6 apps. When repeating a sentence, the audio gets identified by Google. A score is given, showing the number of words that are correct, and how many are incorrect. The student is advised to focus on a specific word, if the tone of a specific word is incorrect. For example, 有 yǒu (to have), has third tone, while 又 yòu (once again), has fourth tone.
Chinesimple from Khanji School, HSK5 app. https://khanjischool.com/
Using the right tools, and adapting the learning method as needed, help with getting a better understanding of what needs to be learnt for each stage of the process of learning Chinese language.
Chinese Zero to Hero provides videos about learning Chinese, starting from HSK1 to HSK7-9.
Chinesimple from Khanji School provides apps for learning each level of HSK exams, from HSK1 to HSK6, and has the new HSK3.0 words for each app.
The boundaries between HSK5 and HSK6 are vague. HSK5 exam has words from HSK6, which includes 5000 words. To pass HSK5, one must know HSK6 words, or otherwise would not understand all the questions, and would end up guessing answers for some of the 100 questions that should be finished within 2 hours, for listening, reading and writing. There is a separate speaking exam, HSKK 高级 exam, should be done with HSK5 and HSK6. So regardless of whether one is studying HSK5 or HSK6, it is the same HSKK advanced level speaking exam, which is the highest level out of only three speaking exams for Chinese language.
Some students learn the language quicker than others, and some take longer to study. Each person has their own pace of learning. However, the new learner of Chinese language must not underestimate the amount of time and effort needed to reach an advanced level of Chinese.
2 Dynamic
learning of Chinese: “Shi” is the most common sound in Chinese Words from HSK1
through HSK6. By Serene Zawaydeh. November 24, 2024
3 Tips
for Practicing Writing Chinese Characters. By Serene Zawaydeh.
September 10, 2024
4 Change
is the only Constant Thing in the Process of Learning Chinese. July
19, 2024
5 Making
up Stories using Chinese Characters. 看汉字写小故事！by Serene Zawaydeh. June 29, 2024
6 What
if… Higher Levels of HSK Chinese Tests could be Redesigned? By Serene
Zawaydeh. April 2, 2024
8 The
Ongoing Process of Learning Chinese, HSK5. By Serene Zawaydeh. January 10,
2024
9 Lost
Bag Story, Handwritten in Chinese. By Serene Zawaydeh. March 16, 2023
10 我的汉语学习方式- 做完HSK四之后! By Serene
Zawaydeh, February 13, 2023
12 What
does the process of learning Mandarin Chinese look like? Some tips for new
learners. By Serene
Zawaydeh, January 20, 2022
