Most characters aren't arbitrary shapes to memorize — they're 2–4 known pieces stacked together, often with a meaning clue built in. This course teaches those pieces first, so each new character you meet is mostly already familiar.
Lessons
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Lesson 1
人 木 水 口 日
Building Blocks: Your First Five Components
Pictographs that appear inside hundreds of other characters — and two that change shape when they move inside a compound.
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Lesson 2
女 子
Woman and Child: 女 / 子
Two high-frequency components, plus why 子 often means nothing at all as a suffix.
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Lesson 3
大 小 中
Big, Small, Middle: 大 / 小 / 中
Exactly what's printed on every drink, snack, and clothing size — you'll be able to test these immediately.
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Lesson 4
上 下 出 入
Up, Down, Out, In: 上 / 下 / 出 / 入
Indicative characters — diagrams of a relationship rather than pictures of a thing — and the exit/entrance signs you'll use everywhere.
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Lesson 5
一 二 三 十
Counting to Ten (Almost): 一 / 二 / 三 / 十
Three are tally marks. The fourth, 十, lets you read every number from 10 to 99 without learning anything new.
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Lesson 6
四 五 六 七 八 九
Counting to Ten, Completed: 四 / 五 / 六 / 七 / 八 / 九
The remaining six digits — none follow the tally pattern, and one has a documented reason for breaking it.
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Lesson 7
山 火 土
Mountain, Fire, Earth: 山 / 火 / 土
Four of the five classical elements are now complete. 山 closes two loops from earlier lessons; 火 doubles into a blaze.
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Lesson 8
月 天 年
Moon, Sky, Year: 月 / 天 / 年
With all digits in hand, three more characters let you read and write complete dates in Chinese.
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Lesson 9
百 千
Hundred, Thousand: 百 / 千
Two characters that take you into the numbers you actually need for prices, hotel rates, and train tickets.
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Lesson 10
金 贝
Metal, Shell: Money Vocabulary — 金 / 贝
The fifth classical element closes out, and the "shell/cowrie" component explains a cluster of modern money vocabulary.
Reference
Component Glossary — every component, compound character, and word taught across all lessons, in one searchable table.