The three measure words gen, zhi, and tiao have similar characteristics. They all indicate a long and thin shape and are used with many of the same words. Previous studies have investigated their meanings and usages, but usage in firsthand language materials and efficient methods of teaching these measure words to foreign students have yet to be explored. This study distinguishes their etymological and lexical differences, examines and integrates previous studies, and calculates their frequencies in the Academia Sinica Balanced Corpus of Modern Chinese. The result is used to design picture-based examples that provide assistance in the teaching of these three measure words.