Chinese pronunciation is very different from that of English. That's why it's such an important component of learning the language—and why professional teachers spend time explaining the differences among those similar sounds.
Pronunciation, Pronunciation
Mandarin is not a phonetic language. The pronunciation is not related to the writing of Chinese words (characters).
Mandarin is a tonal language, which means that the way a sound is pronounced directly affects the meaning of what is said. English does not have tones, since words don't change their meanings when you pronounce them with different intonations.
However, in Chinese, different tones represent different characters and meanings.
If you spend too little time mastering the tones and proper pronunciations, you run the risk of your confidence being dented by an overload of similar vocabulary. Persist with pronunciation, and you will lay an unbreakable foundation for your Chinese learning.
There are four main tones and one neutral tone in Mandarin Chinese (or, as some say, five tones). Each tone has a distinctive pitch contour, which can be graphed using a five-level system.
Pinyin
Pinyin is a system created for people to learn Mandarin pronunciation (and an input method to enter Chinese characters into computers). Pinyin transcribes Chinese characters so people can pronounce them. The writing of Pinyin is similar to the English alphabet. You can pronounce every single sound out in Chinese using pinyin.
However, Chinese pronunciation and the spelling of pinyin letters are different from English letters. The sounds, which the letters of pinyin represent, do not correspond exactly to the sounds of the letters in English. You cannot pronounce Pinyin as if it were English.
One Chinese sound is associated with one syllable, and each Chinese character has its own pinyin syllable. There are three parts in a pinyin syllable, with are the Initial, Final, and Tone. Initial and Final represent the segmental phonetic portion of the language, rather than letter by letter.
There are many Chinese characters with the same initials and finals, like the above "mother, fiber, horse, curse, and question mark" example.
Limited Syllables and Simpler Grammar
Practicing the four tones is necessary, but the good news is that the number of syllables in Mandarin is very limited. Mandarin grammar is also simpler than that of most European languages. There are no articles (as there are in English), genders (as in German and French), or cases (Russian). The verb is not changed to express the tense. The time of the action is indicated in the context.
The basic Chinese sentence order is: Subject + Time (when) + Place + verb. There are some special verbs which break the rules, and are put before the place and not after it.
A more involved sentence structure might be:
Subject + time preposition + Time + location preposition + Location (from the biggest to the smallest) + how (can be adverb or a phrase containing the preposition) + Verb + time duration + indirect object + Object.
There are exceptions, whereby the subject can be located after the time. An adverb phrase can also be located before the verb (or noun), and not after it.
Characters
The difficulty of Chinese words is largely overestimated. Every Chinese character has its meaning and is then used as a part of other words.
Mandarin writing is of two types. One is "traditional," while the other is "simplified," with fewer strokes. Simplified characters were introduced during the 1950s, in a bid to increase the rate of literacy. They have gained popularity and been accepted as the official writing system in mainland China and Singapore as well. Traditional Chinese characters are in use in places like Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan.
You'll learn words first, then grammar, then read passages. Learning Chinese in a group setting enables you to benefit from interacting with people who are facing the same challenges. None are perfect, and so you will not hesitate if you err. Being enthusiastic and finding someone to share your trials with, you will learn from each other's mistakes.
Listening to Chinese music and watching Chinese soaps is a fun way to master the language and test your comprehension abilities away from the routine classroom. If you enjoy cartoons, they are also a good way to introduce yourself to the way the language tells a story. This helps to enhance your listening skills and mark the accents of the speakers.