WEB-BASED MATERIALS AND APPLICATIONS FOR CHINESE LANGUAGE TEACHING

Transcription

1 FULL RESEARCH REPORT of the project WEB-BASED MATERIALS AND APPLICATIONS FOR CHINESE LANGUAGE TEACHING Supported by the 2009 Taiwan Research Visiting Scholar Grant by the Ministry of Education of Taiwan

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3 Full report FULL RESEARCH REPORT of the project WEB-BASED MATERIALS AND APPLICATIONS FOR CHINESE LANGUAGE TEACHING During the period between July 27, 2009 and August 16, 2009, I have accomplished the shortterm research project with the focus on web-based materials and applications for Chinese language teaching. My work included three major parts, i.e. consultations with some distinguished professors and experts of the local university, visiting bookstores for Chinese language teaching, and visiting providers of different language-related software. PART ONE VISITING NATIONAL TAIWAN NORMAL UNIVERSITY, GRADUATE INSTITUTE OF TEACHING CHINESE AS A SECOND LANGUAGE At the beginning of my stay in Taipei, I visited Professor Hsin Shih-chang from the Graduate Institute of Teaching Chinese as a Second Language. He is an expert on several fields, including computer-based language learning, language curriculum and instructional design, information processing in Chinese etc. He collected a number of materials which we briefly discussed, and because of lack of time we agreed to keep on discussing these issues via in the near future. Namely, in the year 2009/10 or 2010/11 I intend to publish studying materials for Slovene students of sinology, which will also cover some selected chapters from Hsin s materials, among other things. For the time being, Slovene population knows very little about Chinese information processing, encoding systems and character sets, a variety of input methods for Chinese characters, development of Chinese fonts, useful tools for language learning etc. Secondly, in the January 2009, National Taiwan Normal University launched new online course, called Distance learning for Chinese Practical Writing ( 華語文應用寫作教學 ). The purpose of this course is to give students an instruction for understanding the various categories of Chinese practical writings, usage, and development of students writing ability in this genre. The course contents generally include letters, public letters, note writings, special occasion invitations, telegrams, business documents, contracts, regulations, conference minutes, memorial dedications, writings appropriate to important occasions (birth, death, marriage, etc.), and personal and commercial classified ads, as well as Chinese culture tips introduced following with people s interactions with each other. Since this course is created with Moodle, it is very convenient for our department to offer it as an elective course in the 3 rd of 4 th grade. NTNU has already agreed to such cooperation. Professor Hsin also kindly gave me a brand new product Learning Chinese Language & Culture from Movies; Ang Lee s Eat Drink Man Woman, which includes three interactive CD-ROMs. 3

4 Mateja Petrovčič: Web-based materials and applications This tool may improve one s listening and reading skills using interactive functions, offers pronunciation and intonation practice through the speech recognition engine, gives better insight into Chinese culture through the so-called Cultural Window. Another invaluable and precious experience was to meet Dr. Lien Yujen, who is an expert in programming and is working on compiling a set of applications, which are very useful for every teacher of Chinese language. His set of tools includes system utilities, text processors, reading utilities, multimedia support, applications for graphic design, adopted and improved internet browser and his blog with some instructions. Since all these tools might be stored on a portable disc, they are very convenient for use on different computers. His Etools can easily be installed just with one click and they appear in the bottom of screen, as shown below: Portable Firefox is enriched with several add-ons, which help user to browse internet sites or download files with ease, convert simplified characters to traditional and vice versa, use mouse more effectively etc. In addition, there is a variety of precious sites marked in the Favorites folder. There are some graphic tools for editing graphic materials, some applications that are related to multimedia, 4

5 Full report some reader applications, system utilities etc. Dr. Lien Yujen kindly keeps on updating his homepage with several interesting information. To follow all the novelties really takes a lot of time and energy. I am also very grateful for the opportunity to test some of the applications in the institute s computer-lab. 5

6 Mateja Petrovčič: Web-based materials and applications PART TWO USEFUL STUDYING MATERIALS IN SOME BOOKSTORES Second part of my research was to visit different bookstores, to get insight into materials which are currently in use and might be a fresh alternative to materials at our department. After thorough comparison, I have bought several books and CD-ROMs related to the development of Chinese script, grammar, pronunciation and multimedia. The thorough description of all materials gathered would be very time-consuming; therefore I decided to present just some of them for different fields of teaching Chinese: first, a set of books for learning Chinese script; second, a set of textbooks for learning Chinese as a foreign language; third, a software for more accurate pronunciation of Chinese; fourth, a comprehensive grammar of Chinese; and fifth, a manual for teaching Chinese with multimedia with many useful tips. 1. AMAZING CHINESE CHARACTERS A set of three volumes with CR-ROMs introduces evolution of a few hundred characters from ancient to modern forms. The content is presented either in the printed form or on a CD. Volume Chinese Characters for Beginners includes the evolution of 100 characters, relates them to 500 words, and provides some games and listening comprehension tests. Volume Amazing Chinese Characters: Animals presents 100 characters relating to animals, some of which can also be found in the previous volume. Each character is presented from three aspects, i.e. evolution of forms, pronunciation and proper stroke order. Volume Amazing Chinese Characters: Plants & Nature follows the identical format and introduces a hundred characters relating to plants and nature. Here are some screenshots of the CD-ROM: 6

7 Full report The content of CD is divided into three major sections: Introduction to Chinese Characters, Learning Chinese Characters, and Games and Exercises section. The Introduction to Chinese Characters section consists of ten pages; its aim is to provide a brief description of different styles of script from the early times to the present days. User enters the Learning Chinese Characters section via this table on four pages. Characters are grouped together according to their resemblance, and they progress from simple to complex. A cluster of slides provides information about pronunciation, origin and proper stroke order of the selected character, with several words as examples of usage. The Games and Exercises section aims to test the user s comprehension of the characters and examples learned in the Learning Chinese Characters section. There are three games available: Memory Game, Stroke Game and Listening Comprehension. One of the subjects for the first year students of sinology focuses on the development and description of Chinese script. These materials are very useful for the visual enhancement of presented contents; therefore they will be used in the teaching process. I believe that such interactive approach will contribute to greater effectiveness. 7

8 Mateja Petrovčič: Web-based materials and applications 2. PRACTICAL AUDIO-VISUAL CHINESE ( 視聽華語 ) At our department, we use two different kinds of textbooks for contemporary Chinese. Guoyu with traditional characters is based on the series Practical Audio-Visual Chinese. Recently, we have been using the first edition. The second edition, found in bookstores of Taipei, is quite similar to the first one, however with some important improvements. To my opinion, the most significant are better audio files. In the first edition, the speed of speech was not appropriate and did not sound natural. For this reason, the majority of our students did not use those audio lessons. New mp3s are much better and sound very natural. Following the renewed studying program, we will extend the language classes to five years; therefore the second edition is also more convenient for us. Namely, it consists of five volumes. Further more, thanks to some enthusiasts all over the world, one can find a complete list of vocabulary used in these textbooks on the internet. By importing them to flashcard software, studying becomes much more attractive, interesting and effective. 3. CAI FOR MANDARIN PHONEMES & TONE TRAINING The pronunciation of Chinese seems to be quite easy, however to produce more or less accurate syllables is not so simple. Software, which may help students to achieve this goal, is called: CAI for Mandarin Phonemes & Tone Training ( 電腦化華語發音測驗與教學 ). 8

9 Full report In general, it is divided into three independent parts or systems, i.e. the so-called: -- Tone Production ( 聲調唸讀 ) -- Tone Discrimination ( 聲調聽辨 ) -- Phonetic Articulation ( 聲母韻母教學 ) First part visually presents resemblance (or difference) between teacher s pronunciation and student s pronunciation. Pitch-contour analysis simultaneously presents two graphs, where one can see the difference between two persons. It is often the case, that student cannot hear what is wrong and why his/her syllable does not sound exactly like the one from native speakers. Second part provides exercises and tests for proper pronunciation of tones, whereby one can choose single syllable or several syllables. Lists of different combinations are attached to the program. This system would be very useful for beginners and intermediate students to refresh their knowledge; whereas the first part is more useful for intermediate and advanced students or linguistic researches. Third system focuses on exact articulation of every sound in Chinese. I believe it should become a part of teaching materials for foreign students, since it offers a non-stop assistance provided the student has computer with Macromedia s Flash Player, whereas a teacher is available just in the classroom. 4. MODERN CHINESE GRAMMAR Bookshelves are overloaded with various grammar books on standard Chinese, offering different approaches to Chinese language. For the purpose of teaching Chinese as second language, I would recommend the following book: Modern Chinese Grammar for Teachers of Chinese as a Second Language Advanced Learners of Modern Chinese Authors Prof. Liu Yuehua et al Taiwan Edition Dr. Teng Shou-hsin On one hand, this publication may be a neat reference book for all advanced readers who want to get a general idea about the structure of Chinese language; and on the other hand, it provides answers to several specific questions, which arise in the process of learning Chinese. This grammar book may be used on different levels, in different phases of learning/teaching Chinese, from the first year students up to the fifth year students. 9

10 Mateja Petrovčič: Web-based materials and applications 5. TEACHING CHINESE WITH MULTIMEDIA Last but not least, I want to mention a publication with the highest concentration of useful tips on my research issue. It is entitled Teaching of Chinese as a Second Language with Multimedia 華語電腦輔助教學 by 齊玉先 Author presents several tips how to use a combination of programs that come in the package with Microsoft Office, where to find additional software for specific purposes, tells the reader how to make the best out of internet and points to several useful sites, which may be extensively applied in teaching process. This publication can be a very helpful manual for teachers with different knowledge of information technologies. Everyone can find something useful in it, from those who are not very skillful with computers, to those who already master all kind of tricks. Gained knowledge may contribute to more interesting language classes. The only weakness of some of applications mentioned here is their limited use. Several applications allow to be installed and registered only once, therefore we have to be very careful to apply them on a relatively stabile computer, which will hopefully not collapse soon. According to my experience, the most useful bookstore seems to be Lucky Bookstore or Shida shuyuan youxian gongsi, quanguo jiaoyu tushu zhuanmaidian ( 師大書苑有限公司, 全國教育圖書專賣店 ), with the highest concentration of teaching materials for Chinese language. The reader, who might be interested in visiting this bookstore, will appreciate the exact address and the location of this bookstore. 台北市和平東路一段號 2 樓 Taibeishi Heping donglu yiduan hao 2 lou 10

11 Full report PART THREE STORES WITH LANGUAGE-RELATED SOFTWARE The third part of my research plan was to visit several stores with software and other computerbased equipment, which might be useful for our users, i.e. speakers of Chinese. I have gathered information on different products, such as 筆通中文語音 IMB Via Voice 快樂頌, various versions of 蒙恬筆 PenPower, 筆通手寫王 Penmaster, TwinBridge Chinese Partner 雙橋中文伙伴, TransWhiz etc. Speech recognition input method is very useful for native speakers, but not very favorable among foreigners. On the other hand, it is the ideal coercion device, if someone wants to master tones in Chinese. Unless the spoken words are accurate, the input method is very timeconsuming and not very effective. The other problem is pronunciation of words that behave different on Taiwan and on Mainland China, e.g. 法國 (Fàguó vs. FƮguo). Handwriting recognition input method is very similar thing. The accuracy rate is nowadays so high, that this input method is very convenient for native speakers, but not too much for foreigners. However, in order not to forget how to write characters, we foreigners should really force ourselves to use it more frequently. According to my experience, the optimal district to search was the Guanghua Market ( 光華商場 ), with the highest concentration of electronics, computer and IT shops in Taipei, if not even on Taiwan. For the reader who might be interested in visiting this place, here is the address with the screenshot of the map: 光華商場台北市中正區市民大道三段 Guanghua shichang Taibeishi Zhongzhengqu Shimin dadao san duan (close to the Zhongxiao Xinsheng Station) 11

12 Last but not least, I would like to express again my sincere gratitude and thanks to be granted the 2009 Taiwan Research Visiting Scholar Grant by the Ministry of Education of Taiwan. During my visit, I have gained much invaluable knowledge and met outstanding professors.