Chinese 431-Advanced Conversation

Assignment 5: Telling a Story

For the 5th assignment, you will tell a story. It can be a ghost story, a joke, a story of an accident or anything memorable (such as the most memorable day of your life).

First, we will have practice sessions with partners. Try to figure out as much as you can and the whole class can help you figure out any remaining problems. You can also email me drafts for feedback. For monitoring pronunciation errors, you can use Njstar’s “convert to pinyin” function to have a pinyin-annotated version of your story. Just remember that since one character can have more than one pronunciation, you want to make sure that the given pronunciation is the one you want.

You should always make sure that you are understood. Do not ignore the audience.

The tape is due on 3/23/06, Thursday.

Some key pointers:

Key ingredients: time, place, people, action, how something happens, consequence,

Use the BA construction for “doing some action B to some object B with result C”

Use the BEI construction for “some action is done to some object with certain result”

Use “Verb DE complement” to describe the extent/result/degree of an action

Use the right verb:

Be as specific as possible; avoid overuse of generic verbs.

Use the right form of the verb: ongoing or completed

Use the right adverbs to describe how some action happens or is carried out:

Suddenly, unconsciously, slowly, forcefully, carefully, etc.

Use sequencing expressions, whether chronologically or not:

Before, after, at the same time as, while