hmm, i was under the old higher chinese syllabus so textbook to
us is damn precious....
it all comes down the foundation, same goes for english or any
other language. but if u are willing to spend sometime to brush it
up, den shld be no problem.
sec sch i still recommend u to use textbook, because das where
hints comes from 
but of course, if u wan to expand and improve your language, then
"reading" newspaper is the best
when i say "read" newspaper, not just read thru, flip it and forget
abt it. at the end of the day, u will still forget. My suggestion
is that, take a notepad and a pen with u, when u are reading
newspaper and see a word that u nvr seen before or u dun
understand, write it down in your notepad. do this for every
article you read in your newspaper. when u finished reading the
newspaper, take a chinese dictionary and check out all the words u
do not know. rmb the hanyupinyin and zhao ju of the words (if ur
dictionary has it), write down everything.
treat it as ur own little mini dictionary, revise it every now and
then.....
