Have the knowledge of Chinese characters
At HSK1, for Chinese characters, hand- writing is not so important at this level. Having some basic knowledge of Chinese characters such as the strokes, strokes order, the structure of the characters are enough.
“Observe” Chinese characters
At HSK2, your main task of learning Chinese characters is “observe”. You do not need to use a pen to copy stroke by stroke, it is more effective if you can carefully observe and analyze the characters in your mind. However, you can use computer to write Chinese (full pinyin input). A very useful exercise is to listen to the text audio recording of a lesson and typewrite it in Chinese, and check if you make any mistakes. By doing this exercise, it not only enhances your ability of Chinese characters recognition, but also consolidates your pinyin foundation.
Practice in the effectively way
At HSK3 and HSK4, both “observing” and “writing” are very important for memorising characters. Now due to the popularity of computers, most exchanges with Chinese characters are type-written instead of handwritten. Some may think that there is no need to write if you can type. This is not right. Hand-writing is surely a plus since calligraphy has been a significant part of Chinese culture heritage. Practices spread out over time are much more efficient than you write 10 times at one go.
Since HSK3, It is the right time for you to understand the “ phonetic part” within characters. As you know, 85% or more Chinese characters consist of radicals to indicate meanings and sound elements to indicate sounds. To group them yourself and you will learn Chinese characters faster and better.
At HSK5, it is a milestone that you can recognise 1,500 Chinese characters. You will no longer forget a lot of “old” characters since you can always link the newly learned characters with the previously learned ones.
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