We count lots in class to make sure counting in Chinese comes as natural as counting in English!

Counting backwards can be tricky though, but feels good when you can do it without thinking!

Of course it’s best to learn in a song! Here is my little girl singing a song that will get you counting backwards in Chinese no problems!

Here are the lyrics:
一二三四五六七
七六五四三二 一
一二三    三二一
一二三四五六七

Yī’ èr sān sì wǔ liù qī
Qī liù wǔ sì sān èr yī
Yī’ èr sān     sān’èr yī
Yī’ èr sān sì wǔ liù qī

When you get more confident, you can add a little record scratching rap to the last line, saying the number four 四 3 times, (like my little girl does in the video) like this:
一二三四四四五六七

Heard the tune before? We used the popular Chinese song ‘Where is my Friend?’ for the tune, which you can see below:

You can see how we use this song in our class on another blogpost of mine the ‘Where is my Friends? Blogpost.