一个日本人，拿着一把刀，站在大门口，砍了四个人。It is the word zhao 照 which means shining. I could create something like there is a Sun (日) which shore lights rays like (刀)on the mouth (口) and the mouth dropped 4 saliva (四个点). Visual stories tend to be remembered better than non logical ones.
2) Let them play with Chinese words and phrases. Play creates good memories and enhances learning. using parts and sides, let pupils go into text book and find as many words based on parts or sides. let them compete for best finders' award. (good for primary schools) find word pairs, find cheng yu that started with certain words etc, make sure the process is fun.
3) Do with a time limit
Pupils loved a challenge and certainly loved timed challenges. I tried "find a word in dictionary in 12 seconds", "Read a paragraph in 2 minutes" or "read all spelling words in 5 minutes". Show them the clock, demo once for them and time your try. Ask them if they can win you by doing it using less time or do more for same time. Encourage good try, let them win a few times (innocently) to enhance their interest. (even if the improvement is 0.01 seconds, to pupils its means a lot to praise that improvement.) At conclusion show that they have improved would inspire them.
4) coach with the objective in mind and their obstacles in sight.
Set their objective straight and know their hardship.
Common hardship:-
a) lack of vocabulary
b) unable to read words apart from spelling lists.
c) unable to pronounce words correctly
d) lack of knowledge on grammar and sentence structure.
e) lack of motivation to study
f) lack of focus and willingness
etc
Some common objectives of our young ones and a common reason for it:
a) wanted to be a star/k-pop star/actor(ess)/sports star/youtuber/muser/popular blogger/instagram star etc. (why study so hard if I can earn more?)
b) wanted to ignore Chinese and score in PSLE.( I'm hoping for an exemption from Chinese etc)
c) wanted an A in Chinese (but plays game like crazy and in every situation)
d) don't know what I want????? (because I really have no idea about my future)
Just like a doctor, look for symptoms and discover the obstacles and prescript medicine to cure. Most obstacles are just symptoms of bad habits, bad manners and bad thinking processes; alter their habits and their results will show.
Now this is in request of a reader on how to make Chinese interesting, hope you like it.
