Essential College Chinese adopts an innovative approach to the teaching of Chinese language to native English-speaking college students and will revolutionize the way Chinese has been taught to speakers of other languages. In recognition of the fact that Chinese is tonal and uses logographs, which do not facilitate the learning of the sounds and tones in Chinese and vice versa, it separates the learning of the Chinese phonetic system from that of the Chinese writing system for beginners first.  In due course, the four language skills (listening, speaking, reading, and writing) in three modes of communication (interpersonal, interpretive, and presentational) are developed integratively. Essential College Chinese has the following innovative features:
Pronunciation of the Chinese sounds and tones is learned and solidified through humorous rhythmic verses.
Basic Chinese characters that used to be pictographs and then formed thousands of other characters are selected for students to learn first.
Students learn to recognize and write basic Chinese characters without worrying about how they should be pronounced at the initial stage.  
Frequently used Chinese words and daily expressions are incorporated into rhythmic verses in each lesson for students to listen and chant as well as to read and write in Chinese characters.
 
Essential College Chinese covers more than 100 basic grammatical points and about 800 characters in 56 lessons in its first two volumes. Students are expected to spend no more than one quarter of their study time in two academic years in college on laying a solid Chinese language foundation for them to continue to learn Chinese at a higher level with confidence and joy.