班级 (bān jí) — class; grade (group of students in school)

Definition

班级 is a fixed administrative unit — the group of students in one class. 班 is the short form used in compounds (班长); 课 means a lesson/subject, not the student group.

noun
classgrade (group of students in school)
Measure word · 个

Examples

  • 班级。
    Wǒ men bān jí yǒu èr shí wǔ gè xué shēng.
    Our class has twenty-five students.
  • 班级。
    Zhè ge bān jí de jiào shì hěn dà.
    The classroom of this class is very big.
  • 班级。
    Tā shì zhè ge bān jí de lǎo shī.
    He is the teacher of this class.

Origin

Compound word
构词法gòucífǎ
联合liánhéSide by side

Two parts of equal weight, alike or opposite in meaning, standing side by side.

班bānclass
级jígrade

班 and 级 are parallel school groupings, together denoting a class or grade.

Characters in this word

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

  • 珏珏juépieces of jade
  • 刀刀dāoknife

班 shows 珏, pieces of jade, and 刀, a knife, cutting them into pieces.

Open 班 →

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

This origin belongs to the traditional form 級; 级 is its simplified writing.

Meaning part形符xíngfú
糹Written in full as糸mìthread
Sound part声符shēngfú
及
及jí級jí
Same sound today

The traditional form 級 has 糹 (thread) and 及 as a sound part; its original sense was a sequence related to silk. The simplified 级 is a later shorthand.

Open 级 →
Appears in
HSK 3.0 Level 3School & Education

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