This article discusses the features of teaching Russian as a foreign language to Chinese students, taking into account the specifics of the Chinese language and and the peculiarities of the Chinese mentality. The relevance of the study is due to the constantly growing interest in the Russian language in the Chinese society in connection with a noticeable increase in the number of all kinds of contacts between Russia and China. Our proposed work is based on the search for optimal ways to increase the effectiveness of teaching Russian as a foreign language to Chinese students. The purpose of the study is to theoretically substantiate and develop a phased system for teaching Russian as a foreign language to Chinese students. The main research methods were the analysis of the academic literature on the methodology of teaching Russian as a foreign language, as well as diagnostic methods, including observation, description, conversation, questioning, testing, and methods of statistical data processing. The article contains comparative analyzes of the Russian language teaching systems in Russia and in China. On the example of practical material for teaching phrase logical units in Russian, containing zoonyms, the role of the native language in understanding the educational material at the early stage of training is shown.