Measure words are very important in Asian languages like Japanese and Chinese. How in English we use phrases like “a chair” or “a book”, Chinese does the same thing. The difference, however, is that different things use different measure words. I’ll show some examples below.

一个人。
Yi ge ren.
One person.

*两本书。
Liang ben shu.
Two books.

三张纸。
San zhang zhi.
Three sheets of paper.

四杯茶。
Si bei cha.
Four cups of tea.

个 ge
Pronounced like “gut”
两 liang^Google
Pronounced like “lee-ah-ng”
本 ben^Google
Pronounced like “bun”
书 shu
Pronounced like “shoe”
张 zhang^Google
Pronounced like “John-g”
纸 zhi^Google
Pronounced like “jist”
杯 bei
Pronounced like “bay”
茶 cha
Pronounced like “cha”

**个 is a measure word for people and objects; universal measure word
本 is a measure word for books
张 is a measure word flat objects (paper, tables)
杯 means and is also a measure word for cups

These measure words are some of the most useful for basic Chinese. Remember that the measure word always precedes the noun it is measuring.
***Number + measure word + Noun

两 means two 2
书 means book
纸 means paper
茶 means tea

¹我的两本书。
Wo de liang ben shu.
My two books.

²你的一杯茶。
Ni de yi bei cha.
Your single cup of tea.

^2_*你的茶。
Ni de cha.
Your tea.

*两 is a strange case in Chinese. Although it means two 2, just like 二, it is used solely for counting, like in the measure word examples. 二 cannot be used for counting anything.

**个 is a funny case in that it is a universal measure word. We should be able to use it in any situation. Unfortunately, we cannot. The appropriate measure word must be used for the appropriate object. When do we use 个 then? Mainly for people and dumplings 饺子.

***The reason I am marking this one is because there are certain occasions when you must use the measure word but do not require a number. I’ll cover that soon.