Expressing Time： Phrases for the Date and Days of The Week

大家好！
This is the second post in a series on expressing time. To go to the first (how to talk about hours of the day), click Here.

The Date:
The general pattern to know: 今天(today) 是 (the number of the month) 月 (number of the day) 号。

What is today's date? 今天是几月几号？

Today is August eleventh. 今天是八月十一号。
Today is August 11th of 2012 今天是 二0 十二 年八月十一号.

Next year: 下年

Last year: 上年 

This year: 今年

The year before last year: 去年

The year after next: 后年 

Here are some example sentences with the English, Chinese, pinyin and literal translation of the Chinese sentence. These literal translations might help you follow a complicated phrase. Keep in mind, however, that most words do not literally translate into English very cleanly, so these interpretations can be very rough.

Next year I will start college.

下年我上大学。

(next year) (I) (start) （college)

Where were you last year?

上年你在哪儿？

(last year) (you) (at) (where?)

My birthday is March 11th: 

我的生日是三月十一号。
(my)(birthday) (is) (third month) (tenth day)

When is your birthday?

你的生日是几月几号？
(your) (birthday) (is) (what month) (what day)

What are you doing this summer?

今年夏天的时候你做什么？
(this year) (summer) (time) (you）（do) (what)?

*note: here, I'm using the ....的时候 construction. For more information about this, go to the previous lesson on time, linked here.

Day of the week:Day of the week:

星期-
This word has a couple translations. First off, it means 'week'. 

Next week: 下个星期 

Last week: 上个星期
Two weeks: 两个星期

However, it can also be used to express the day of the week.

Monday: 星期一

Tuesday: 星期二

Wednesday: 星期三 

Thursday: 星期四

Thursday: 星期五 

Friday: 星期六

Saturday: 星期七

Sunday: 星期日 

Note that we start the week on Monday, making it the first day and Saturday the seventh day. Also remember that Sunday is special; it's usually called 星期 日, ( 日 means sun), or 星期天.
The days of the week are used in sentences exactly as they would be in English:
Today is Monday
今天是 星期一
Wednesday I will go to the library.
星期三 我想去 图书馆

Remember that, like all other Chinese sentences, the time phrase must go first. Thus the phrase "I will go to the library on Thursday" needs to be reordered like the one above：
星期四我想去 图书馆
and you can NEVER say:　 我想去 图书馆星期三

Keep these rules in mind and these sentences will be a breeze! Let me know if I missed anything. What other concepts do you find difficult? Comment below :)
再見！
Sophie Sino