Customer Reviews

Oxford Picture Dictionary English-Chinese: Bilingual Dictionary for Chinese speaking teenage and adult students of English

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

This is a bad thing for anyone learning Chinese because IT DOESNT HAVE PINYIN. BE WARNED.

However, ESL students will love this thing because of the pictures and the English.

However, IT IS WORTHLESS for AMERICANS LEARNING CHINESE.

This is an easy to use picture dictionary organized around themes, such as homes, food, feelings, etc. The illustrations are clear and colorful. There are two big drawbacks, however, the first and biggest being that there is no pinyin used, so a Westerner has no idea whatsoever about how to pronounce the Chinese word, although phonetic spellings for the English words are listed in the index. The second is that the "old style" characters are used, not the simplified versions. This book is definitely for Chinese students learning English but of very limited use for English speakers wanting to learn Chinese. As an ESL teacher in China recently, I found I only used this book as a last resort, when explanations of various words proved impossible, and once when I was teaching a lesson on homes. This book is a useful supplement, but I'm going to try to find something with pinyin when I return to China to teach again.

It's an excellent dictionary for Chinese-speaking student. It's better than the book "The New Oxford Picture Dictionary". It's best for beginner. There are a lot of examples,illustrations,& pictures in this dictionary. Unfortunately, it's out of stock at Amazon.com at this moment(June'99).

extremely useful for those who have Chinese as their mother language and have instrests in learning English, espcially for those Chinese who just arrive Ameria. you can find almost all the nouns in English you may meet during daily life. this book will expediate your English learning process.

Should let buyers know that it's in traditional character. The wording of some items are more commonly used in Taiwan but not in China.

I am trying to learn Chinese, and in seeing my toddler learn English by repeatedly looking at picturebooks, I thought a picture dictionary in Chinese would be a good way to learn every day objects in Chinese. Unfortunately, this book has the English word and the Chinese IN CHINESE CHARACTERS. NO pinyin, no bopomofo pronounciation. For the non-Chinese reader, you'll have to look up every single word. So, though this book may be good for Chinese students learning English, it is of limited usefulness to students learning Chinese. Frankly, I think this is an extremely stupid mistake by the publishers of this book. The editors should be flogged!

Tried to find the upgrade version of The Oxford-Duden Pictorial Chinese & English Dictionary (1989) but bought this one by mistake. It's a desirable well-edited dictionary but only good for children not for technical and professional usage.

A practical took for tutoring and teaching Chinese ESL students of multiple levels. Often, a picture really is worth a thousand words - especially if the student doesn't know a thousand words!

I'm an ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher and use these dictionaries in class. My students inevitably want to buy their own copies and are delighted to find that they are available in bilingual editions for many languages.

The categorical organization of the dictionaries and the inclusion of many everyday items makes them very valuable for those students who are living in the U.S. (and presumably other Western English-speaking countries). My only criticism would be that they don't include any computer-related terms; this could be addressed in a new edition.

Speaking of which, I haven't switched to the so-called "New Oxford Picture Dictionary" because it has far fewer vocabulary items.

Despite the bilingual editions, I don't consider these books to be as useful for English speakers trying to learn a foreign language as for English learners living in the U.S., because the content and categories reflect shopping, homes, services, clothes, and so forth as they are experienced in the U.S. and similar countries.

Another potential area of disappointment is that the OPD should not be one's only English dictionary, since, being pictorial, it is suited to nouns but not to verbs or concepts. As a noun dictionary, it's excellent.

I have not used the extensive additional teaching materials that are available for these dictionaries.

This book is totally mis-reperesented on the basis of its title. It is NOT for use by English speakers. It is directed exclusively and only toward Chinese speakers and readers who wish to improve their English. It's a great book for the Chinese. If you're looking to learn Chinese from it, forget it.