What is Measure Words in Chinese(西安语风汉教中心)

What is Measure Words in Chinese?（西安语风汉教中心）
One of the biggest differences you will find in Chinese is the use of measure words. What is a measure word? We use measure words in English when talking about a group of something. We may say, 'a dozen eggs' or 'a pride of lions.' Dozen and pride are examples of measure words.
Chinese uses measure words not just to describe groups, but also one thing. Instead of saying a pencil or a car in Chinese you would say, ‘one (measure word) pencil’ and ‘one (measure word) car.’ Chinese doesn’t use ‘a’ or ‘an.’ Instead it uses ‘one (measure word),’ or any number, plus the measure word.
The hard thing to learn about measure words is to know what to use with each noun. Books use a different measure word than, say, cats. Cars are different from pencils and trees are different from apples. You will learn new measure words as you’re introduced to new words. For now, though, you need to learn some basic measure words.
“Ge” is the most commonly used measure word. It’s the standard one to use if you don’t know the correct measure word. If you use “ge” wrongly, people will still understand you, but you won’t sound very intelligent.
We’ll say “ge” with basic things. Apples, people and so on.
yíge Zhōngguó rén = a Chinese person.
yíge píngguǒ= an apple
Xiao Yu yǒu yíge Bàba hé yíge Māma. = Xiao Yu has one Dad and one Mom.
“Kuài” is another classifier used to describe pieces of things, like pizza, cake and money. Many times when people talk about money, they will just say “kuài,” as in “jǐu kuài.” People know they mean “jǐu kuài qián” or ‘nine dollars.’
yíkuài qián = one dollar.
yíkuài(r)* dàngāo = a piece of cake.
sānge píngguǒshì bākuài qián = three apples are 8 dollars.
Other words will require different measure words to accompany them. The measure word helps to better understand the meaning of the word. Fortunately, you do not need to remember millions. Although, you may not always have an equivalent in English, you can use some tips to get the concept in several minutes.
(1) běn is generally used as a counter for book-like objects, such as books, dictionaries, pictorials (bound stuff)
(2) zhī : long round objects use zhī-such as pens and pencils
(3) zhāng: large flat objects are counted with zhāng-such as tables
(4) liàng: for Vehicles etc
(5) jià: for airplanes etc
(6) sōu: related with -ship, such as: boats, spaceships and ships etc
Basically, the most commonly used measure word is 个(gè).If you do not know the proper meausre word for some items, it is time to try 个(gè) instead. Native Mandarin speakers do understand what you are talking about. Just remember to ask your Chinese friends what the correct measure word should be after that.。