I just contributed to my second Kickstarter project!
The first time was for a documentary on David Lynch, which I gave Sean as a birthday present. This time around, it was just for me. And an educational one to boot!
Growing up, my mom never pushed me and my brothers to go to Chinese school. Being first-generation born in Canada, she wanted for us to learn English and have an easier time fitting in. Also, being divorced and having three mouths to feed did not leave a lot left over for extracurricular activities.
Luckily, I was very interested in my Chinese culture and so, I had my mom teach me Chinese words and phrases from children’s picture books we used to buy in Chinatown. But that only got me so far.
So when I saw this Kickstarter project, Chineasy, I knew I had to be a contributor. The creator and TED speaker, Shaolan Hsueh, conceived the idea when she had trouble teaching her own children how to master the language.
And so, she came up with this methodology of pictographs, forms that mimic the objects they represent. This “illustration” would then leave an indelible impression in the mind.
There are around 20,000 characters in the Chinese language. Knowing 4,000 words means you’re educated, 2,000 words means you’re literate and 200 means you can get by.
Chineasy will start with 8 building blocks: fire, tree, sun, moon, person, mouth, door and mountain. This in turn will turn into 300 characters and later on, a thousand. Luckily, I already know the 8 building blocks, so hopefully, it’ll be easy for me to learn.
Along with 902 other backers, I pledged 30GBP, which will gift me with the paperback book featuring 192 pages of building blocks, compounds and phrases with handy explanations. Estimated delivery will be in December, so I’m considering this as an early Christmas present to myself.
I can’t wait to get my linguistics learning hat on.
Photo: Kickstarter
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