I'm so pleased to learn that you and your classmates are learning chinese.And a chinese dictionary can help you a lot.
You know that a dictionary is a good teacher.You can learn normal
pronunciation and correct grapheme.From looking through the dictionary,you also can make a better understanding of the meaning of words.
To help you learn chinese quickly and well,I will intorduce two dictionary to you.As follows:the first one is The English-Chinese/Chinese-English Dictionary,which contains many examples,usage,
instruction and so on.The other one is the Xinhua Dictionary ,the most popular chinese dictionary in China.
With the help of these dictionaries,and the efforts you give,I think you can learn good chinese.
Yours
Li Yue