Study Pinyin

Study Pinyin is a reference app that helps you learn Pinyin. It is based on the book by the same name.

The app includes 64 different characters, grouped in 4 categories. Each character has four learning modes: learn it in words, learn to spell, learn it in a sentence, and tongue twister. The first mode gives you four words that use the character. The second one lets you play a recording of the four tones of each character. The third one lets you listen to and read the character in a complete sentence, both in English and Chinese. Lastly, the fourth mode presents a tongue twister using the character.

All of the modes are accompanied by nice drawings and all the sample sentences are translated into English, which is very useful. The graphical user interface is quite responsive and easy to navigate. All the buttons are in Chinese and English as well.

In most of the modes, you can click on any word or character to hear it pronounced by a native speaker. In the modes where a whole sentence is read in Chinese, it is also read in English afterwards. So, basically, you can also use this app to learn some English as well.

I played around with the app for a few minutes, and I learnt to say things like carrot, and "the uncle is reading". I found the application to be a nice way to get started on learning Pinyin.