If your children speak English but you’d like them to learn Chinese, the DailyNoodles Chinese Activity Books are a convenient way to start.
When my daughter was 2 years old, I was speaking only English to her but wanted to start teaching her Chinese. At the time, since I could not read Chinese, I had no idea where to begin.
Thankfully, I found these Chinese Activity Books by DailyNoodles which helped us learn Chinese numbers and animals in Mandarin Chinese!
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DailyNoodles Chinese Activity Books for Children
Titles and where to buy: (click on the links below)
ISBN: 978-0991466504 (Numbers), 978-0991466528 (Animals)
Authors: Andrea Chen Lin and Yalan Tsai
Publisher: DailyNoodles, Incorporated
Language: English, Simplified Chinese, and Pinyin
Recommended age: 3-7 years
Who should consider the DailyNoodles Chinese Activity Books?
These Chinese activity books are most appropriate for:
- Busy parents who don’t know how to make hands-on Chinese activities from scratch.
- Families who speak English or mostly English; they are also good for fully bilingual families as well who are transitioning to a Chinese speaking environment.
- Toddlers and early elementary school children who are learning animal names and numbers in Chinese.
- Kids who like to color and make simple crafts.
- Some exposure to Hanyu Pinyin and simplified Chinese characters
What’s inside the DailyNoodles Chinese Activity Books?
Both Chinese activity book starts with guide from the authors as well as a star sheet to keep track of your child’s progress.
Instructions are mostly in English with keys words in simplified Chinese and pinyin.
At the top of each page is a spot for your child to write his or her name.
A variety of interactive activities are included, and the end of the book has a certificate of completion.
Tips for using the DailyNoodles Chinese Activity Books
- For activities that don’t involve cutting and pasting, consider laminating or using a sheet protector for repeat use! This will allow your child to repeat many Chinese activities. I recommend this laminator and these laminating sheets.
- Please note that your children will not be experts at Sudoku, math, or Chinese writing after using this book! However, be familiar with Chinese numbers and common animal names.
- Whenever possible, speak Chinese with your child while doing these activities. This will help your children to develop fun memories with Chinese conversation!
Here’s a closer look at each Daily Noodles Chinese activity book!
1. Daily Noodles My Fun Chinese Book: Numbers
The Chinese numbers book has 70+ colorful pages activities which include:
- Number recognition
- 1:1 correspondence
- Logic puzzles
- Sorting, comparison, and measuring
- Cut-and-paste matching
- Pattern recognition
- Basic addition to make recognizing and using simplified Chinese characters familiar and fun.
The numbers book starts with basic Chinese number recognition and gradually becomes more advanced.
A few Sudoku games are included as a basic math problems.
Although these activities seem to be geared for preschoolers and Kindergartners, we used the Daily Noodles Chinese Numbers activity book intermittently when my daughter was 2-3 years old.
My daughter had phases where she would get really into the book and want to do several pages.
Then she become interested in something else, and then came back to enjoying the activities.
Here’s a peak of some of her work at age 2. In the image below, I helped her with the pink star, but she did the other parts independently.
2. Daily Noodles My Fun Chinese Book: Zodiac Animals
This book focuses on the 12 Chinese zodiac animals:
- 鼠 (Shǔ/ Rat)
- 牛 (Niú/ Ox)
- 虎 (Hǔ/ Tiger)
- 兔 (Tù/ Rabbit)
- 龙 / 龍 ( Lóng / Dragon)
- 蛇 (Shé / Snake)
- 马 / 馬 (Mǎ / Horse)
- 羊 (Yáng / Goat, Sheep, Ram)
- 猴 (Hóu / Monkey)
- 鸡 / 雞(Jī / Rooster)
- 狗 (Gǒu / Dog)
- 猪 / 豬 (Zhū / Pig, Boar)
The Chinese zodiac animals book has 70+ pages of matching games, dot-to-dot drawing, pattern recognition, and paper crafts.
In addition, Chinese stroke order is introduced for each animal name.
My daughter loved the colorful crafts!! She went through this book much more quickly than the numbers book.
Here’s a photo of the Chinese Zodiac animal crafts!
This would pair well with our free printable Chinese Zodiac Wheel and Chinese New Year books!
Final opinion of DailyNoodles Chinese Activity books
In summary, I recommend these DailyNoodles Chinese Activity books for busy families who want convenient, hands-on learning crafts.
To be honest, I probably won’t buy the books again since I’m comfortable with making my own Chinese learning activities now.
However, I look forward to doing the extra books I bought with my son when he’s older!
And I would definitely recommend it for beginner Chinese learners! I think it can help encourage kids to start learning and speaking the minority language as it did for our family!
Additional Chinese learning materials from DailyNoodles
Food group placemat from DailyNoodles
We have had this laminated placemat for 2 years and it is durable! For a young child, I think the placemat is a bit too busy to learn how to read the Chinese characters.
However, for myself as a beginner Chinese speaker, I thought this was an extremely useful prompt for common dinner table words and Chinese food names.
Chinese Label Decals
We have these Chinese labels around the house. The pack comes with 47 labels for household items (eg, wall, window, trashcan, microwave, fireplace).
I purchased these a few years ago and some are still up in their original position. Others were easily removed, but they are not reusable. I found the labels to be helpful for myself due to the large Chinese characters and small Pinyin.
However, I do not think they are helpful for young children. The illustration is distracting from the text, and the font is cartoonish rather than standard KaiTi.
My daughter usually remembers Chinese characters quickly, but I’m don’t think that she has gained much from these Chinese labels. Instead, we typically use plain Post-It notes to create a print-rich environment in the minority language.
Has your child or student used these Chinese activity books?
Please let me know if you have any questions in the comments section below!
Tips for boosting Chinese skills
- 20+ Ways to Get Your Child to Speak Chinese
- How to Find a Foreign Language Teacher for Your Child
- 5 Ways My Child and I Learn Chinese from Audiobooks
- How I Taught My Child 1000+ Chinese Characters as a Non-Fluent Speaker
- Handmade Cards for Reading and Writing Practice (English, Chinese, and Korean)
Chinese resources for kids on Amazon!
Click here to see Chinese learning tools and cultural toys on Amazon!
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