Learning resources · Pronunciation and writing basics
Stroke order rules
Chinese characters are built from a few basic strokes, written in a fixed order. Learn seven rules and you can work out the order of most characters.
The basic strokes
Every character is built from a small set of basic strokes. Their Chinese names are worth learning, because teachers and dictionaries use them: héng (horizontal), shù (vertical), piě (left-falling), diǎn (dot), nà (right-falling), tí (rising), zhé (turning) and gōu (hook).
- 一横 héng
- 丨竖 shù
- 丿撇 piě
- 丶点 diǎn
- ㇏捺 nà
- ㇀提 tí
- 𠃍折 zhé
- 亅钩 gōu
The seven rules
- 十先横后竖
Horizontal before vertical: in 十, write the horizontal first, then the vertical. - 人先撇后捺
Left-falling before right-falling: in 人, the left stroke first, then the right. - 三从上到下
Top to bottom: the three strokes of 三 from the top down. - 川从左到右
Left to right: the three strokes of 川 from left to right; in 你, the left part 亻 first. - 月从外到内
Outside before inside: in 月, the frame first, then the strokes inside. - 国先里头后封口
Inside before closing: in 国, write the left, top and right of the frame, then the inside, and close the bottom last. - 小先中间后两边
Middle before the sides: in 小, the middle hook first, then the left and right dots.
Why stroke order matters
The right order makes characters neater and faster to write and handwriting easier to read, and because your hand repeats the same movement each time, characters are easier to remember.
How to practise
Watch the order, trace it, then write the character from memory.
In the HuWolMont app every character shows its stroke order. Finishing the tracing passes the character; writing it again on a larger blank grid earns 1 to 5 stars, with notes on the strokes that need another try. The level vocabulary pages list the characters each level practises.
Questions
Do I really need the correct stroke order?
Yes, especially at the start. A character written in the wrong order may look the same, but it is slower, tends to come out crooked, and the handwriting is harder to read.
Do I have to write every character I learn?
Not all at once. In HuWolMont each lesson picks a few characters to write; the others you first learn to recognise.
Pronunciation and writing basics
- Pinyin for beginnersHow pinyin works: initials, finals and tones; aspirated and unaspirated sounds; flat and curled tongue; -n and -ng; and the spelling rules learners most often get wrong.
- Tones and tone changesHow the four tones and the neutral tone sound, where the tone mark goes, and the three tone changes you meet in Level 1: two third tones, “一” and “不”.
- Measure wordsIn Chinese a number cannot go straight before a noun; a measure word comes in between. Here is how they work, with selected measure words in the textbooks for levels 1–6.
From the HuWolMont HSK 3.0 textbooks, written to the 2025 HSK syllabus.