Dr. Tung Liu
Home		 Elementary Chinese for Overseas Chinese
Organized by Tung Liu
 
README (Readme)

A. Introduction
The files in this website are teaching and learning supplements for the Elementary Chinese for Overseas Chinese 美洲版修訂華語課本. The Elementary Chinese for Overseas was published in Taiwan. This volume of books is for elementary schools level and is designed for overseas Chinese. It has been widely used in the Chinese schools in the U.S. for the immigrants from Taiwan.
 
These supplements serve two purposes. First, the lessons in these supplements do not include Zhuyin fuhao (注音符號). It is a good practice for advanced students to read Chinese lessons without Zhuyin fuhao. Second, the lessons are also available in simplified Chinese characters. In addition to learning traditional Chinese characters, the students can learn simplified Chinese characters from these supplements.
 
There are twelve books in the original volume and 12 or 16 lessons in each book. I typed each lesson in a text file. For traditional Chinese characters files, the files are encoded with traditional Chinese Big 5 code. For simplified Chinese characters files, the files are encoded with unicode. Then I converted these text files into Word documents. The PDF files are generated from these text or Word files. The PDF files are easy to read and print. You will need to use Acrobat Reader to read and print PDF files.

B. How to Use

  1. Double-click on "index.html" to browse the main page.
  2. Use Acrobat Reader to read and print PDF files.
  3. The "Big 5 Text" files are text files with Chinese Big 5 codes. The text files for simplified Chinese texts are encoded with unicode. If you want to edit these files with a text editor, you will need to install a Chinese software, such as TwinBridge.
  4. Word documents use two types of fonts. For traditional Chinese documents, I use TSC UFangsong S TT, 16 font, bold. For simplified Chinese documents, I use TSC JSong SG TT, 16 font, bold.
  5. Installation of Chinese Fonts: You can install Chinese fonts as in the following.
    1. Click Start/Control Panel. Double-click Fonts icon.
    2. Click File/Install New Font in Fonts window.
    3. Go to the folder with these fonts. Click Select All and OK.
  6. I imported these text files into Microsoft Word. The procedure to convert a text file into a Word document is:

    i. Click Tools/Options in Microsoft Word.
    ii . Select "General" tab.
    iii . Check "Confirm conversion at Open".
    iv . Open a Chinese text file.
    v . Select "Encode text" and click OK.
    vi . Select "Other encoding".
    vii . Select "Chinese Traditional (Big 5)" and click OK. (For simplified Chinese, select "Unicode".)

C. File Descriptions

There are twelve books in this volume. Each file contains either the lessons or characters in each book.

Folders: There three major folders. "elemchnfv" folder contains traditional Chinese files for vertical reading. "elemchnfh" folder contains traditional Chinese files for horizontal reading. "elemchns" folder contains simplified Chinese files.

Chinese Lessons:

  • bkxxtextfvr.pdf: Contain traditional Chinese for vertical reading. These PDF files are for viewing. You can read these files on the screen.
  • bkxxtextfv.pdf: Contain traditional Chinese for vertical reading. The PDF file are for printing. You need to print the file before you can read it properly.
  • bkxxtextfv.doc: Contain traditional Chinese for vertical reading, Word files.
  • bkxxtextfv.txt: Contain traditional Chinese for vertical reading, text files.
  • bkxxtextfh.pdf: Contain traditional Chinese for horizontal reading, PDF files.
  • bkxxtextfh.doc: Contain traditional Chinese for horizontal reading, Word files.
  • bkxxtextfh.txt: Contain traditional Chinese for horizontal reading, text files.

Chinese Characters for Each Lesson:

  • bkxxchafvr.pdf: Contain traditional Chinese for vertical reading. These PDF files are for viewing. You can read these files on the screen.
  • bkxxchafv.pdf: Contain traditional Chinese for vertical reading. The PDF file are for printing. You need to print the file before you can read it properly.
  • bkxxchafv.doc: Contain traditional Chinese for vertical reading, Word files.
  • bkxxchafv.txt: Contain traditional Chinese for vertical reading, text files.
  • bkxxchafh.pdf: Contain traditional Chinese for horizontal reading, PDF files.
  • bkxxchafh.doc: Contain traditional Chinese for horizontal reading, Word files.
  • bkxxchafh.txt: Contain traditional Chinese for horizontal reading, text files.

Chinese Characters with PinYin for Each Lesson:

  • bkxxchapin.pdf: Chinese characters and PinYin, PDF files .
  • bkxxchapin.doc: Word files with Chinese characters and PinYin, Word files.
  • bkxxchapin.txt: Chinese characters and PinYin, text files.

Simplified Chinese Texts

  • bkxxtexts.pdf: Lessons, PDF files.
  • bkxxtexts.doc: Lessons, Word files.
  • bkxxtests.txt: Lessons, text files.
  • bkxxchas.pdf: PDF files with Chinese characters.
  • bkxxchas.doc: Word files with Chinese characters.
  • bkxxchas.txt: Text files with Chinese characters.

Zip Files

  • bkxx.zip: The zip for each book, in PDF, Word, and text files.
  • chinesetextfv.zip: The zip files with traditional Chinese for vertical reading.
  • chinesetextfh.zip: The zip files with traditional Chinese for horizontal reading.
  • chinesetextf.zip: The zip files with traditional Chinese.
  • chinesetexts.zip: The zip files with simplified Chinese.
  • chinesetext.zip: The zip files with all files.
  • bkxx.zip: The zip for each book, with traditional Chinese in PDF, Word, and text files. (Note: For vertical reading, the PDF files are not zipped since the file sizes are too big.)

C. Construction of the Files
The texts are typed with UltraEditor and Twinbridge. I generate the PDF files from text files for vertical reading. I use Chn FFangsong S5@Vt and Chn FFangsong S5, 18 font, bold in these text files for printing. For horizontal reading and simplified Chinese, I generate the PDF files from Word documents. The PDF files for vertical reading (bkxxxxxfvr.pdf) were modified from the original PDF file (bkxxxxxfv.pdf) with Acrobat using "Document/Page/Rotation".

D. Author and Date
Tung Liu
email: tliu@bsu.edu
Homepage: http://www.cs.bsu.edu/homepages/tliu
June 10, 2004.