The mALSO POSSIBLE: Methods by which Chinese characters were created (3&4)

TheA third way in which Chinese characters werehave been formed is associative, or compound ideographic associations.

This time,Often our ancestors tried to express a meaningidea by combining several pictureideograms.

It's can be combined bywith the sun 日 and the moon 月.

TheA fourth oneway characters have been formed is picto-phonetic.

TheseSuch characters in this way usually have two parts, with one component indicating meaning and the other referring to theits sound.

For example, 材 originally means timber.

The methods by which Chinese characters were created (3& & 4)

Add space before and after the “&” symbol.

This time, our ancestors tried to express a meaningconcept by combining several pictures.

It's a combined byation of the sun 日(日) and the moon 月(月).

If you know the characters 日 and 月, it would beis easy to understand 明.

Another example is 鸣, which is a combined by mouth 口ation of “mouth” (口) and “bird 鸟” (鸟) and means "chirp".

The fourth onemethod is picto-phonetic.

These cCharacters formed in this way usually have two parts, with one component indicating meaning and the other referring to the sound.

For example, 材 originally means t “timber.”

“Originally meant” implies that the meaning has changed: it originally meant “timber” but today it means something else. Is this what you’re trying to say?

The left part, 木, is its meaning (wood; tree), and the right part, 才, is its sound (cái).

The third way in which Chinese characters were formed iwas associatively, or as compound ideographics.

"associative" is a loose adjective, it needs something to apply to, I changed it to an adverb so it could apply to the action of forming.

It's a combined byation of the sun 日 and the moon 月.

The sun and moon characters are the object of the sentence, not the subject, so it's wrong to say it's "combined by ...".

Another example is 鸣, which is a combined byation of mouth 口 and bird 鸟 and means "chirp".

The fourth onemethod is picto-phonetic.

"one" is a little ambiguous is if you're added it to the list of examples, or the list of methods, so it's better to use something more specific than "one".

These cCharacters formed in this way usually have two parts, with one component indicating meaning and the other referring to the sound.

This time, our ancestors tried to express a meaning by combining several pictures.

Here, "a meaning" strikes me as unnatural-sounding. I understand why you worded it like this, but just "meaning" will suffice here.

It's a combined by ation of 日 (the sSun 日) and 月 (the mMoon 月).

(1) Alternatively: "It's formed by combining..." This would be more faithful to the Chinese translation, "组合而成".
(2) I would employ parentheses here. The emphasis is on the Chinese characters, not their English translations, so the latter goes in parentheses.

Another example is 鸣, which is combined by formed by combining 口 (mouth 口) and 鸟 (bird 鸟) and means "chirp".

Same as above.

These cCharacters inof this waytype usually have two parts, with one component indicating the meaning and the other referring toindicating the sound.

Refer: 指. It's probably not as appropriate as "indicate" here.

For example, 材 originally meanst timber.

"Originally" refers to a time in the past, so the past tense is expected.