"Chinese grammar without tears" enough for HSK Basic?

[edelweis]

Hi,

I've been learning Chinese mainly with the Assimil "Chinese with ease" book up to lesson 63, but now I would like to take HSK Basic this spring (but still no date announced for the international session). However Assimil is a bit light on grammar, and the vocab does not match the HSK list.

Anyway. I am now watching a lot of chinese TV and doing some reading and listening with the Chinese Breeze books, and working on the 1033 word HSK vocab list.

I bought this small book "Chinese grammar without tears", does anyone know what HSK level one could hope to obtain after assimilating all that it contains?

(I've studied the first chapter about questions and rhetoric questions, about 1/2 I already encountered in the assimil book or other reading, although they are more clearly explained in the grammar book).

thanks!

(I can post the grammar book's TOC if anyone is interested.)

[edelweis]

hmm after reading up about HSK I realised just how little Chinese I know...

So I would be happy if I get only HSK level 1 in a few months.

But still, I am curious to know about the level of the contents "Chinese grammar without tears"... does it contain everything one would need to know, say, for HSK level 3?

So here is the TOC:

1) Ways of asking questions (including rhetoric questions)

2) Sentences with an adjective predicate or a nominal predicate

3) Existential sentences

4) Ways of showing time and aspect of action

- Ways of showing time

- Ways of showing aspect of action

A the progressive aspect

B Continuing action

C The perfect aspect

D An action which is going to happen

E Action experienced in the past

5) The modal particle "le" 了

6) Complement

- complement of result

- complement of direction

- complement of state

7) The shi...de 是...的 structure

Expressing comparison

9) The passive voice

10) "Ba" 把 sentences

11) Negatives

12) Numbers

13) Measure words

14) Separable words

15) Adjective reduplication

16) Verb reduplication

17) The modal particle "ne" 呢 and "ba" 吧 (these were also used in chapter 1)

18) "neng" 能, "hui" 会 and "keyi" 可以

19) "yidianr" 一点儿 and "you yidianr" 有一点儿

20) "jiu" 就 and "cai" 才

21) "dou" 都, "quan" 全 and "suoyoude" 所有的

22) "gang" 刚 and "gangcai" 刚才

23) "you" 又, "zai" 再 and "hai" 还

Edited January 17, 2010 at 02:55 PM by edelweis
unwanted smileys appeared

[Daan]

That list seems to cover most points that would be important for a beginning student, although it obviously depends on how well the book is written. Another work I would personally recommend is Schaum's Outline of Chinese Grammar.

[edelweis]

Thanks Daan. I can't say that the book is terribly well written, and there is no translation for the example phrases, so I need to research a bit to really understand, however I still like it because it is not intimidating.

[edelweis]

hmmm while reviewing the first few chapter I noticed some example sentences that I don't understand... could someone explain what they mean/how they illustrate the grammar rule?

1) In the "rhetorical questions" section:

"Other question forms with rhetorical tone. The meaning of the sentence depends on the context and the tone.

...

是不是？我就知道他会来的。"

2) In the "use of interrogative pronouns as indefinite pronouns" section.

"Interrogative pronouns can refer to somebody or something that cannot be stated or does not need to be stated.

...

他可能是谁的同事。"

"The same interrogative pronoun appearing in two related clauses... can refer to the same person, same thing... can also refer to different people or things.

...

你这篇文章写得太乱了，哪儿连着哪儿我都看不清楚。(different places)"