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HSK Beginner: Fill-in-the-Blanks Exercise #8

Beijing is starting to get cold, so turn on that electric heater, bunker down to the Internet and throw yourself into our latest HSK test for beginning students. In today's sample exam, we pit you against 15 questions which measure your grasp of the basics. Do you know the difference between 的, 地 and 得? Are you licensed to handle Chinese conjunctions, prepositions, and articles? Do you know the right measure word to use with common nouns? And can you beat a savage Dongbei tiger in unarmed combat?

If the answer to any of these questions is no, you definitely need to be taking these tests. But the good news is the road to Beginner mastery is not really all that steep. And if you can keep up at our pace, you should be ready to tackle our Intermediate materials by Spring. Please remember to extend your subscription before tackling the tiger though.

vladimir.dutton

said on

November 7, 2008

Finally a relatively easy one! Almost perfect, but not quite. I ended up getting question #2 wrong and it was very stupid of me, but there's the seduction of 个 for you. At least I won't forget that again.

brett

said on

November 7, 2008

13/15 - good quiz.

nadasax

said on

May 13, 2009

i thought 也 could only be used to introduce a new verb phrase adding aditional information to the preceding verb phrase...how is 不一定快乐。a new verb phrase adding information to the original?

trevelyan

said on

May 13, 2009

@nadasax - think of a much simpler example. Where is the verb in this sentence?

我很好。他也很好。

Some textbooks refer to adjectives as stative verbs, which might be why someone taught you that rule. Otherwise it does not make much sense. If we've said somewhere that 也 only precedes verb phrases we'll definitely want to clarify.

I'd guess the confusion is being caused by the lack of a consistent terminology for referring to Chinese parts of speech in English translation. This is a problem since different textbooks use different definitions. Should we refer to 介词 as prepositions or coverbs? Does Chinese have adjectives or stative verbs, etc. And how many different categories of adverbs are there?

Practically speaking, the rule as you learned it is wrong unless you have a very specific definition of what constitutes a verb in Chinese. It doesn't make sense in the grammar framework we use to explain and understand the language, which is the dominant one in mainland China and - we believe - the most useful and intuitive one for native English speakers looking for traction in the language. Where there are differences in terminology used to describe concepts we try to highlight them in our podcasts, but it's understandable if someone dealing with multiple textbooks gets a headache sometimes. That's my understanding of the problem at least. Maybe Echo and Gail can chip in with more expert advice.

Gail天堂的声音

said on

May 13, 2009

@nadasax,@trevelyan,

talking about the Chinese grammar, i have to admit that sometimes i get a headache too. however, grammar is a very interesting part in language learning.

What we must know is: the chinese grammar rules are quite different from english or any other language. Don't feel unacceptable when you find something not the same as in English.

eg. 我想去问问有没有人想去北京。---in this sentence we have lots of verbs together.

你最近过得怎么样？-最近你过得怎么样？-怎么样你最近过得？-过得怎么样你最近？---look, we change the order of words in this sentence, and they are all correct when we talk.

So let's have a look at adjectives in chinese. Just like trevelyan said, we have many different definitions for adjective. But we have one thing for sure, that is:

Different from English, adjectives in chinese can be put in front of a verb, and can be used as predicate. eg. 他快(a.)来(v.)了。这个女孩美(a.)极了(particle)。

Some adjectives can be verbs at the same time. You need to remember that when you are learning the very word.

Gail天堂的声音

said on

May 13, 2009

@trevelyan，

好can be a adjective: 你好吗？我很好。(most of the verbs cannot be put after 很，exceptpsycholigical verbs），这是个好东西。我们过上了好日子。

好can be a verb: 你的病好了吗？

好can be a adverb: 这儿有好多人。

toneandcolor

said on

May 13, 2009

I often tell my students that all this confusion about parts of speech (the grammar book I use calls 好 an "adjectival verb") actually works out to be in the CSL student's favor: no rules about conjugation and verb agreement, and much simpler constructions for sentences that would be bristling with prepositions and noun cases in other languages.

In response to Gail's example question above, "你的病好了吗？", the short and elegant response "好了“ is so much simpler than figuring out what the appropriate verb would be in Chinese for "gotten" in "It has gotten better."

nadasax

said on

May 14, 2009

@travelyan

not to quible but in your example you are doing exactly what i said 也 is for, adding new information onto an already existing verb phrase 我很好。他也很好。好 is indeed a verb and the 也 is introducing a new verb phrase which adds additional/new information to the previously stated verb phrase of 很好。, expanding it to 他也很好。

In the example on the test i don't see this...

my point is not to say you guys are wrong, my point is to ask can you explain either the multiple uses of 也 which the grammar book i'm using says can only be used to introduce a new verb phrase expanding/adding new info to the previously stated verb phrase, or explain to me how 不一定快乐。is a verb phrase which is being added to the original...