新年快乐xin nian kuai le!  I hope you had a great 圣诞节sheng dan jie (Christmas).

Just a quick reminder that Mandarin Club will resume as normal in the first week of term (the following Monday for Monday club members, as term begins on a Tuesday).

In the meantime, can any of the Junior children unscramble these pinyin adjectives for me?  If you can, post your answers as a comment or show me in school.  TIP: the number of characters in a Chinese word is the same as the number of syllables.  Chinese syllables can only end with a vowel, an 'n', or a 'ng' sound.

Easy (1 character):

ANNOYING - naf

HANDSOME - ahisu

Medium (2 characters):

BEAUTIFUL - ilapnogia

SCARY - pake

INTELLIGENT - moncggin

HAPPY - axigong

DANGEROUS - aweinix

CUTE - eika

Hard (3 characters):

INTERESTING - soiyuyi

TALENTED - noyacuigen

This term the Juniors have been doing a lot of work on family: learning how to say and write about the members of our immediate family.  Here are some of the words and phrases we have been using:

ni jia you ('yoh') shei? 你家有谁?- who is there in your family? 

wo jia you ('yoh')... 我家有... - in my family there are...

jia 家 - family or home;   wo 我... - I/me or 'my...';   ni 你 - you or 'your...'

baba 爸爸 - father;  mama 妈妈 - mother;  gege ('guh guh') 哥哥 - older brother; 

jiejie ('ji-yeh ji-yeh') 姐姐 - older sister;  didi 弟弟 - younger brother;  meimei 妹妹 - younger sister;

liang ge 两个- two (of something or somebody) / san ge 三个 - three of... (and so on)

wo de... 我的... - 'my...' (for anything that belongs to you; we just use 'wo' on its own when talking about family members, though.  So 'wo baba' = 'my daddy' and 'wo de pengyou' = 'my friend' .)

xiao gou 小狗 - little (pet) dog;  xiao mao 小猫 - little (pet) cat;  (hen duo) yu (很多)鱼 - (lots of/several) fish

he 和 / hai you ... 还有... (different ways of saying 'and' or 'and also...' at the end of a list.  Remember that the Mandarin word 'he' sounds like 'huh', not 'hee'!  And 'you' sounds like this: 'yoh'!)

hen 很 / hao 好 / feichang 非常 - different ways of saying 'very' / 'really' / 'extremely...'

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Activity:  read the pinyin and work out who David and Sally live with...

David:  "Sally, ni jia you shei?"  Sally: "wo jia you wo baba, wo mama, wo jiejie, wo meimei, he wo.  Ni ne?"

David: "Wo jia you wo, wo mama, wo san ge didi, hai you wo de xiao mao".

Can you work out what they say next?

Sally: "San ge didi?!  Hen duo!  Ni you san ge didi, ni xihuan ma?"  David: "Wo bu xihuan!  San ge didi hao fan!"

Sally: "Ni xihuan ni de xiao mao ma?"  David: "Wo feichang xihuan!  Wo de xiao mao hen ke ai!" 

Leave a comment to guess or talk about your answers!

Mandarin Club classes will resume on Monday 10th, Wednesday 12th and Thursday 13th September 2012.  Junior clubs run from 4-5pm and Infant clubs from 3.15-3.50pm.  Please remember that timings for some Year Three groups may be different to last year.  If you did not receive the letter at the end of last term, or if you have yet to confirm your preferred day, please call or email, either during the summer break or as soon as possible into the new term.  Many thanks to all of you who have already got in touch. 

And to all of you: have a wonderful summer!  祝大家一个美好的暑假！