HSK 5 · Function Words

首 shǒu “measure word for songs and poems” in Chinese

Same in Traditional

What 首 means

  1. measure word for songs and poems
  2. first
  3. head
  4. chief
  5. first (occasion, thing etc)
More meanings from CC-CEDICT
  • classifier for poems, songs etc

How to say 首

  • Pitch chart of the third tone: dips low then rises, 2 to 1 to 4 on the five-level scale首shǒu3rd tone, dipping

首 in a sentence

  1. 你能给我们唱首歌吗？

    Nǐ néng gěi wǒmen chàng shǒu gē ma?

    Can you sing us a song?

    Sentence #13943583 from Tatoeba

  2. 她翻译了一首诗。

    Tā fānyì le yì shǒu shī.

    She translated a poem.

    Sentence #10696122 from Tatoeba

  3. 哪首是你最喜欢的歌？

    Nǎ shǒu shì nǐ zuì xǐhuan de gē?

    Which is your favourite song?

    Sentence #1695402 from Tatoeba

How 首 is built

Each colour is one part of the character. Parts repeat across thousands of characters, so learning them makes new words easier. See all 214 in our radicals chart.

The character 首 (shǒu) drawn as one shape
首shǒuhead

首 is a single shape of 9 strokes. Learn it whole, then watch its stroke order below.

How to write 首

首 9 strokes

Watch the order, then press Try writing it and draw each stroke in the grid. Each stroke is checked as you go.

首 (shǒu) stroke order chart: each stroke of the character in the order you write it
Stroke order chart for 首 (shǒu). Red marks the next stroke, so you can copy it onto paper one step at a time.

Words related to 首

Words with 首

首都shǒudū · capital (city)首先shǒuxiān · first (of all)首饰shǒushì · jewellery首要shǒuyào · foremost元首yuánshǒu · head of state

More words: Function Words & Grammar

日常rìcháng · day-to-day如何rúhé · how始终shǐzhōng · from beginning to end似的shìde · as if似乎sìhū · it seems事先shìxiān · in advance随时suíshí · at any time随手suíshǒu · as you go

FAQs

首 (shǒu) means “measure word for songs and poems” or “first”. It is an HSK 5 word.
Say it shǒu: shǒu with a 3rd tone. Press Listen at the top of this page to hear it, or Slowly to hear each tone clearly.
Yes. 首 is written the same way in Simplified and Traditional characters.
Add a Chinese (Simplified) pinyin keyboard to your phone or computer, type shou with no tone marks or spaces, then choose 首 from the suggestions. Typing shou into this dictionary’s search box finds it too.
首 is an HSK 5 word in the HSK 2.0 word lists.

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Sources: meaning and pinyin checked by a native Mandarin teacher against the official HSK lists. Extra meanings from CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0). Example sentences from Tatoeba (CC BY 2.0 FR). Character parts and stroke order from Make Me a Hanzi.