我的一天
Wǒ de yìtiān — My Daily Routine
The unit that turns single sentences into a connected account. Students narrate a whole day in order — and learn the word-order rule that separates fluent-sounding Chinese from translated English.
The rule of the year: time goes before the verb
English hangs time on the end. Chinese puts it near the front, every time:
我每天六点起床。
Wǒ měitiān liù diǎn qǐchuáng. — literally “I every-day six-o’clock get-up.”
Saying 我起床六点 is the single most common beginner mistake in Mandarin. Students who fix it in Grade 3 never make it again.
Unit objectives
- Describe a full day in six or more sentences, in order
- Place time expressions before the verb reliably
- Link events with 先…然后 — first… then
- Read and write ten new characters
Key vocabulary
起床 刷牙 早饭 上学 放学 回家 作业 睡觉 先 然后
A day, told in order
Morning routine
Six things students do before school, each attached to a time. Sequencing cards get put in order.
School and after
The rest of the day, plus the deliberate contrast drill: the same sentence said the English way and the Chinese way.
First… then…
先 and 然后 join separate sentences into a narrative. The first taste of connected prose.
Write your own day
Six sentences about their real day, written in characters with pinyin allowed for anything not yet learned.
A school day in China
The shape of the day is noticeably different. School often starts around 7:30 with morning exercises outside, breaks for a long midday rest — sometimes an actual nap — and runs later into the afternoon, with lunch eaten at school. Comparing timetables side by side is one of the best activities in Grade 3: the vocabulary is identical, so all the student’s attention goes on the content, and they end up genuinely curious about someone else’s ordinary Tuesday.
Unit 1 progress check
A light, no-pressure way to see what’s sticking:
- Can your child describe their morning in three sentences?
- Does the time come before the verb?
- Do they use 先 and 然后 to join events?
Word order is the whole unit. It’s worth gently correcting every single time it slips this year, and then never having to again.