The 13th North American "Yellow River Cup" Chinese Reading Contest Announcement

The Yellow River is the mother river of the Chinese and the banks of the Yellow River is the origin of Chinese culture and language. To help students to better study Chinese and improve their Chinese reading skills, eWriteChinese.com is hosting the “YELLOW RIVER CUP” Chinese Reading Contest in North America.

This contest has been held once a year since 2012. The participants have significantly improved their reading and comprehension of Chinese. The 13th contest started on May 1, 2024, and end on August 31, 2024. Registration opens on March 20, 2024，and end on August 1, 2024. Welcome everyone to participate!

Introduction

For many people, studying Chinese is hard. This is especially true for students not living in a Chinese-speaking environment. One effective way learn the language is to start reading early and do it repeatedly. Since Chinese characters are pictorial-based, one disadvantage is that it cannot be spelled out, but an advantage is that once the form of the character becomes familiar, it becomes easier to remember. This is the “secret to success” for studying Chinese. 

How do you to encourage students to begin reading more? First is to choose reading material with subjects students can relate to, and second is to leverage their competitive spirit by giving them an incentive to compete with peers to improve their reading speed and comprehension. 
 
Selections from the "A Blade of Grass Reflecting the Spring Sunshine" provides excellent reading material for students from elementary to middle school to build reading comprehension. Based on the students’ current reading level, we designed multiple choice questions for each passage from the book to measure and document their progress. 

Through this method of having students reading in competition, we can give them the motivation to reach their goal of attaining a higher level of reading ability. We ask for parent to take this opportunity to support and to encourage your children to join this competition, so that they may attain the level of reading ability in order to study independently.

Preparation before registration

1. Test words and view reading samples before registration:

Every student who wants to participate in a reading contest or reading course is best to go to the literacy game page of this website to take a free word test.（http://www.ewritechinese.com/evaluation/）

There are 1050 characters in the primary part of the test. Each character is divided into two parts: pinyin and English meaning. There are 2100 points in 53 pages. There are only 20 words per page on the webpage, 40 points. The test is not required to be completed at one time. You can do a few pages a day and complete it in 2-3 weeks. Click after each page is finished “submit”（submit），Student scores will be automatically deposited on the website.

• If the score is less than 800 (that is, less than 400 literacy), it is best not to participate in this year's reading competition for the time being, so as not to encounter difficulties in reading and dampen students' enthusiasm for learning Chinese.
• If the score is 800-1000 (ie 400-500 literacy), I hope that parents can read about 20 articles. The so-called band reading means that when the students first read the first 20 articles, the parents and students read together. Of course, it is mainly for students to read. Parents only tell students the words they don’t know, explain the meaning of individual sentences or questions, and the answers must be chosen by the students.
• Those with a score of 1000-1600 (500-800 literacy) hope that parents can help students read about 10 articles, and then let the students read them by themselves.
• If the test score reaches about 2000 (that is, the literacy of Chinese characters is about 1000), we believe that students can complete the reading independently. I hope that parents can answer questions in time, which will be more conducive to students' Chinese learning.

The word test should generally be conducted from January to May each year. Hope everyone can hurry up and complete the word test in time.

2.  Try samples：

The website has provided a sample page, including 6 beginner and 3 intermediate essays. Click the link of the title to see the sample article. on the chart“ Minimum score ” The number indicates the relative difficulty and length of the essay. Students can try to read and answer questions first, from easy to difficult, short first and then long. Then decide whether to participate in this year's reading competition. eWriteChinese/Sample eReading/

Contestants and Duration

The 13th North American “Yellow River Cup” Chinese Reading Contest for everyone is currently open to US and all other countries. All participants are welcome to participate. Most are elementary, middle school and high school students who has learned Chinese as second language.

Contest will be held annually and lasting 4 months. The 13th “Yellow River Cup” Chinese Reading Contest registration open on March 20, 2024, end on August 15；and reading and answering will begin on May 1st, 2024, and will last until central time 12 o'clock in August 31, 2024.

Reading Material

For the Beginner participator, use "A Blade of Grass Reflecting the Spring Sunshine". The eBook is free for participants. Contestants can logon and download online at the eWriteChinese/Registration/

For the Intermediate participator, use the "Shanxi Story - Historical Figures “ which you can find in bookstore，or a free e-copy for the contest. 

For the advanced participator, use the "Journey to the West (西游记)“, which you can find in bookstore，or a free e-copy for the contest. 

Contest Entry

To join, go to the eWriteChinese.com/ and "Registration" the contest at $25. The contestants must have an eWriteChinese account to be eligible, using their username and password to enter the competition Control Panel page and begin reading for the contest. 

The competition has 101 short Chinese passages to choose from. To get credit for reading the passage, contestants will answer 10 multiple choice questions (in Chinese) regarding the passage read. There's the option to submit all 10 answers at once or complete them in multiple sessions. Once answers are submitted, contestants can view the scores. QUESTIONS CANNOT BE REATTEMPTED AFTER THEY ARE SUBMITTED. 

Awards and Prizes

The 13th North American Yellow River Cup Chinese Reading Contest for Beginners awards are outlined below.

• One 1st place award of $50
• Two 2nd place awards of $25 each
• Three-nine 3rd place awards of $15 each

The 13th North American Yellow River Cup Chinese Reading Contest for Intermediates awards are outlined below.

• One 1st place award of $50
• Two 2nd place awards of $25 each
• Three-nine 3rd place awards of $15 each

The awards are based on total score; in the event of a tie, the contestant who completed the contest earlier will be awarded. All contestants who reach 70% of the total score will be issued a Certificate for the 13th Chinese Reading Contest. The winners will be announced on the website on October 1, 2024, and the prizes will be sent out on the same day.

Feedback

We welcome feedback about the contest any time through our website.

A big thank you to all participants, and best of luck to you all!

eWriteChinese Admin Contact us

Congratulations to all winners in the 12th Yellow River Cup Chinese Reading Contest!