I.
Greeting
1. How do you greet your friend in Chinese?
If he/she said 你好, we can say: “That right”
2. So if it’s someone older than you, how do you greet them?
If he/she still said 你好, we can say: “emm no wrong, 你好 is the most common expression used to greet
people. BUT there’s another way to greet people that older than you, It’s 您好. “您”is the respectful form
of “你”, so If you want to show respect you can use “您好”.
3. Then what about when greeting a group of people? For example, when you come to class and
want to greet all your classmates.
Let’s me tell you, If you’re talking to more than one people, you can say 你们好！. “您们”is the plural form of
“你”. You can also say “大家好”, “大家” means “everyone”.
II. Long time no see
1. Suppose you now meet a friend you havent’ seen for a long time, how would you greet that
friend in Chinese?
Yeah, “好久不见” means “Long time no see”. You can also ask: 你好吗？<Are you good?>
你怎么样？= 你最近怎么样? <How are you doing?>
你忙吗？<Have you been busy lately?>
Then let do a conversation.
III. Ask for contact information （选一个问题 1 或 2）
1. Can I ask your contact information? 你的电话号码是多少？
If he/she doesn’t understand what “你的电话号码是多少?” is, we can explain to him it means “What’s your
telephone number?”.
If he/she understands the question, listen to them read their phone number (fake number). Then teach
them When reading room numbers or telephone numbers, we read the number “one”, “yi” as “yao”.
2. How do you ask for a phone number in Chinese?
Yeah that’s right you can ask: “你的电话号码是多少?” Then ask me.
We will say: 我的电话号码是: 1………. Then he/she will ask us: What is “yao”? (If he/she doesn’t ask we can ask
them: Just now in my phone number, I said the word “yao” many times. Do you know what it means?
3. How about your email?/ How about email, do you know how to ask for an email address?
你的邮箱是什么？<What’s your email address?>.
Teach him/her how to say @ in Chinese.
But nowadays, In China most people don’t get in touch with emails, we use Wechat, so I will teach you
how to ask to add someone as friend on Wechat. / Do you know Wechat? Do you use it? Oh 我可以加你的微信
吗？<Can I add your Wechat?>
IV. Introduction
1. Can you introduce yourself in Chinese? 你叫什么名字？
If he/she doesn’t understand, we can explain “你叫什么名字” means “What’s your name?”
2. So X is your family name and Y is your given name? 哦 nice to meet you XY, 我叫 ABC, A is my family
name and B is my given name.
3. In your country, the family name also comes before the given name?
Then tell to him/her: Chinese name are usually made up of 2 or 3 characters and family name comes
before the given name.
Let him/her ask us : So family name must be really important in Chinese => So how do you ask for just
the family name?
4. You can ask: 你姓什么？<What’s your family name?>， or you can ask 您贵姓？（In formal occasion, it
shows respect）
And when people ask you “您贵姓?” You can use this pattern to answer:
免贵姓 plus your family name
This pattern helps you to be humble and being modest is an important part of Chinese culture
5. Now you try asking me.
Let him/her ask us and answer their question.
6. Ok, now is the second question, “你是哪国人？”<Where are you from?>
If he/she can’t answer the question then teach them use this pattern: You can say 我是 + your country
name + 人. For example: I’m from China so I can say “我是中国人”.
7. So I’m talking to a <某国家> friend and I know you’re from <某国家> , but I want to know where
you’re from in <某国家> . Where you’re from in <某国家> ?
8. Do you want to know where I’m from in China? You can ask me: 你是哪儿人？or 你是哪里人？
Let him/her ask us and answer, then ask them again but in Chinese.
