Download or read book Second Language Acquisition of Mandarin Chinese Tones written by Hang Zhang and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2018-07-03 with total page 163 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tones are the most challenging aspect of learning Chinese pronunciation for adult learners and traditional research mostly attributes tonal errors to interference from learners’ native languages. In Second Language Acquisition of Mandarin Chinese Tones, Hang Zhang offers a series of cross-linguistic studies to argue that there are factors influencing tone acquisition that extend beyond the transfer of structures from learners’ first languages, and beyond characteristics extracted from Chinese. These factors include universal phonetic and phonological constraints as well as pedagogical issues. By examining non-native Chinese tone productions made by speakers of non-tonal languages (English, Japanese, and Korean), this book brings together theory and practice and uses the theoretical insights to provide concrete suggestions for teachers and learners of Chinese.
Download or read book Perception and Production of Mandarin Tones by Native Speakers and L2 Learners written by Bei Yang and published by Springer. This book was released on 2015-02-10 with total page 167 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tones are the most challenging aspect of learning Chinese as a second language, and L2 learners’ perceptual categories differ in important and fascinating ways from those of native speakers. This book explores the relationship between tone perception and production among native speakers and non-native learners as illustrated in the experiments the author conducted with native speakers, true learners and heritage learners, all of whom were tested on their ability to produce tones naturally and to perceive 81 synthesized tones in various contexts. The experiments show that each group processes tones differently with regard to both register (tonal level) and contour (tonal shape). The results also reveal how three types of cues – acoustic, psychological and contextual – influence non-native speakers’ tone perception and production.
Download or read book Advances in Chinese as a Second Language written by Nan Jiang and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2014-03-17 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is a collection of 13 empirical studies examining the acquisition and processing of Chinese as a second language. On the acquisition front, these studies explore the acquisition of structures such as the perfective marker le, wh-questions, bei- constructions, and bare nouns, and examine the factors that may affect acquisition such as learners’ background, anxiety, and instruction. Processing studies cover topics such as the identification of Chinese tones, the recognition of characters, the processing of compounds and relative clauses, and the expression of motion events. Many of these studies represent pioneering and cutting-edge research on their respective topics, and all will be of interest to students and scholars who are interested in the study of acquisition and processing of Chinese as a second language.
Download or read book Research in Chinese as a Second Language written by Istvan Kecskes and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2013-05-28 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book aims to address one of the main problems of Chinese language teaching: lack of research base. The rapidly growing interest in Chinese language teaching has not resulted in the development of a strong research background. This book attempts to change the current situation. The volume consists of three chapters. Chapter I: Research Base for Practice contains three papers, each of which uses research findings as a basis for solving issues connected with practical language teaching. Chapter II: Integrating Culture and Language is about one of the most intriguing topics of current language-oriented research: how to integrate culture into the process of language teaching. Chapter III: Acquisition of Language Structures consists of studies that investigate the acquisition of certain grammatical structures in Chinese. There are only a few papers in the literature on this issue, so the articles in this chapter are especially important for further research. One of the most important features of the volume is that each paper makes an attempt to bring together theory and practice by focusing on theory-building based on practice or theory application in practice. Thus the book can be recommended to both researchers and practitioners.
Download or read book Speech Perception Production and Acquisition written by Huei‐Mei Liu and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-09-14 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book addresses important issues of speech processing and language learning in Chinese. It highlights perception and production of speech in healthy and clinical populations and in children and adults. This book provides diverse perspectives and reviews of cutting-edge research in past decades on how Chinese speech is processed and learned. Along with each chapter, future research directions have been discussed. With these unique features and the broad coverage of topics, this book appeals to not only scholars and students who study speech perception in preverbal infants and in children and adults learning Chinese, but also to teachers with interests in pedagogical applications in teaching Chinese as Second Language.
Download or read book The Acquisition of L2 Mandarin Prosody written by Chunsheng Yang and published by John Benjamins Publishing Company. This book was released on 2016-02-11 with total page 175 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines the acquisition of L2 Mandarin prosody, a less explored area in SLA. While acknowledging that tone acquisition is one of the most important aspects in acquiring L2 Mandarin phonology, the book demonstrates that phrase- and utterance-level prosody is equally important. Specifically, this book discusses the acquisition of Mandarin lexical tones and utterance-level prosody, the interaction of tones and intonation, the acquisition of Tone 3 sandhis, the temporal differences between L1 and L2 Mandarin discourse, and the relationship between intelligibility, comprehensibility and foreign accent perception in L2 Chinese. In addition, a whole chapter is exclusively devoted to the pedagogy of L2 Mandarin prosody. Studies in this book further our understanding of speech prosody in L1 and L2 and showcase the interesting interaction of phonetics, phonology, and pedagogy in SLA. This book will be of great interest to SLA researchers and graduate students, applied linguists, Chinese linguists, and Chinese practitioners.
Download or read book The Acquisition of Chinese as a Second Language Pronunciation written by Chunsheng Yang and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2021-03-22 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the first edited book to cover a wide range of issues related to Chinese as a second language (CSL) speech, including tone and segment acquisition and processing, categorical perception of tones, CSL fluency, CSL intelligibility/comprehensibility and accentedness, and pronunciation pedagogy. Moreover, the book addresses both theoretical and pedagogical issues. It offers an essential go-to book for anyone who is interested in CSL speech, e.g. CSL speech researchers, Chinese instructors, CSL learners, and anyone interested in second language speech.
Download or read book Methods and Effects of Shadowing Using Online Authentic Videos on L2 Acquisition of Mandarin Chinese Tones written by Ai-Ling Lu and published by . This book was released on 2021 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mandarin Chinese tones are notoriously difficult for second language (L2) learners. Previous research focuses on tone training methods that can help learners produce monosyllabic lexical tones, and studies about the production of multisyllabic lexical tones at the sentence level in spontaneous speech are limited. This study applies shadowing-a method where the learners repeat what they heard with as little delay as possible-to tone training and compares the effects of using authentic videos and textbook audios as shadowing materials for beginner L2 Mandarin learners' tone improvement at the sentence level. Fourteen students in elementary Chinese classes at an American university participated in the tone training activity for four weeks. The participants in the "authentic video" group received authentic videos as their training materials, while the "textbook audio" group was trained with textbook audios. The participants shadowed the materials twice a week, six times per session, at home in their free time. Tone accuracy was rated by Mandarin native speakers according to the pre-test and the post-test consisting of a read-aloud task and a one-on-one conversation. Qualitative and quantitative surveys were conducted to analyze learners' attitudes toward the shadowing activity and the materials. The results indicate that learners in both groups showed significant improvements in their accuracy in spontaneous speech with no significant differences between the two groups. As for learners' attitudes, although the participants reported overall positive feedback on the shadowing activity regardless of the materials, authentic materials generated great interest from the participants and were more appealing to the learners. A strong correlation between learners' confidence in speaking and flexibility of the activity was also found. Based on the finding, pedagogical implications are discussed, including how to select suitable materials and shadowing instructions. For example, educators could introduce textbook audios first and gradually add authentic materials. The findings provide Mandarin Chinese instructors an effective and engaging way to improve learners' tone production in spontaneous speaking. Incorporating shadowing activities into class has great potential to encourage learners' autonomy without occupying precious class time. The findings not only contribute to research on teaching Chinese as a second language and the related pedagogy but also shed light on the use of authentic materials in second language teaching and learning.
Download or read book Key Issues in Chinese as a Second Language Research written by Istvan Kecskes and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-06-26 with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Key Issues in Chinese as a Second Language Research presents and discusses research projects that serve as theoretical grounding for improving the teaching and learning of Chinese as a second language (CSL) in order to help researchers and practitioners better understand the acquisition, development, and use of CSL. With the exception of the first chapter, which is state-of-the-art, each chapter makes an attempt to bring together theory and practice by focusing on theory building and theory application in practice. The book is organized around areas where most future research is needed in CSL: phonology, semantics, grammar, and pragmatics. Consisting of contributions from an international group of scholars working on cutting-edge research, this is the ideal text for researchers, graduate students, and practitioners in the area of Chinese as a second or foreign language.
Download or read book Integrating Chinese Linguistic Research and Language Teaching and Learning written by Hongyin Tao and published by John Benjamins Publishing Company. This book was released on 2016-10-03 with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Linguistic research and language teaching have generally been viewed as two separate types of academic endeavor. While linguists have been preoccupied with pattern finding and theory building, language teachers often encounter issues that are not readily addressed by theoretical linguistic research. This collection, with eleven papers touching upon a wide range of issues, stands out as one of the rare concerted efforts toward a meaningful integration of the two endeavors. Subject matters include tone, stress, word structure, grammatical categories (e.g. classifiers), syntactic structures (including argument structure), discourse particles, implicit and explicit knowledge, conversational repair, and learner corpus. With a diverse range of theoretical orientations, this collection serves to showcase some of the productive ways to create synergy between Chinese linguistic research and language education.
Download or read book The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Second Language Acquisition written by Chuanren Ke and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-03-29 with total page 662 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Second Language Acquisition is the first reference work of its kind. The handbook contains twenty contributions from leading experts in the field of Chinese SLA, covering a wide range of topics such as social contexts, linguistic perspectives, skill learning, individual differences and learning settings and testing. Each chapter covers historical perspectives, core issues and key findings, research approaches, pedagogical implications, future research direction and additional references. The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Second Language Acquisition is an essential reference for Chinese language teachers and researchers in Chinese applied linguistics and second language acquisition.
Download or read book Hacking Chinese written by Olle Linge and published by . This book was released on 2016-03-26 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Learning Chinese can be frustrating and difficult, partly because it's very different from European languages. Following a teacher, textbook or language course is not enough. They show you the characters, words and grammar you need to become proficient in Chinese, but they don't teach you how to learn them! Regardless of what program you're in (if any), you need to take responsibility for your own learning. If you don't, you will miss many important things that aren't included in the course you're taking. If you study on your own, you need to be even more aware of what you need to do, what you're doing at the moment and the difference between them. Here are some of the questions I have asked and have since been asked many times by students: How do I learn characters efficiently? How do I get the most out of my course or teacher? Which are the best learning tools and resources? How can I become fluent in Mandarin? How can I improve my pronunciation? How do I learn successfully on my own? How can I motivate myself to study more? How can I fit learning Chinese into a busy schedule? The answers I've found to these questions and many others form the core of this book. It took eight years of learning, researching, teaching and writing to figure these things out. Not everybody has the time to do that! I can't go back in time and help myself learn in a better way, but I can help you! This book is meant for normal students and independent language learners alike. While it covers all major areas of learning, you won't learn Chinese just by reading this book. It's like when someone on TV teaches you how to cook: you won't get to eat the delicious dish just by watching the program; you have to do the cooking yourself. That's true for this book as well. When you apply what you learn, it will boost your learning, making every hour you spend count for more, but you still have to do the learning yourself. This is what a few readers have said about the book: "The book had me nodding at a heap of things I'd learnt the hard way, wishing I knew them when I started, as well as highlighting areas that I'm currently missing in my study." - Geoff van der Meer, VP engineering "This publication is like a bible for anyone serious about Chinese proficiency. It's easy for anyone to read and written with scientific precision." - Zachary Danz, foreign teacher, children's theatre artist About me I started learning Chinese when I was 23 (that's more than eight years ago now) and have since studied in many different situations, including serious immersion programs abroad, high-intensity programs in Sweden, online courses, as well as on the side while working or studying other things. I have also successfully used my Chinese in a graduate program for teaching Chinese as a second language, taught entirely in Chinese mostly for native speakers (the Graduate Institute for Teaching Chinese as a Second Language at National Taiwan Normal University). All these parts have contributed to my website, Hacking Chinese, where I write regularly about how to learn Mandarin.
Download or read book Phonetic Knowledge as an Aid to the Perception of Mandarin Tone by Second Language Learners written by Jeffrey Ngare and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beginning students of Mandarin Chinese often struggle with the identification of lexical tone. Research indicates that both for native and non-native speakers of tonal languages, the most difficulty is encountered forming an association between the actual pitch contours and their corresponding tonal category. This is especially difficult for Mandarin tones 2 and 3, as their pitch contours are very similar: even native speakers of Mandarin Chinese find the pair confusable (Hao, 2011). In addition, research also shows that vowel height and the presence of a nasal coda also influences perception of Mandarin Chinese tone (Lai and Su, 2011). A successful pilot experiment showed evidence that awareness of the laryngealization that often accompanies the 3rd tone (Kuang, 2013) helped beginner Mandarin Chinese students distinguish between tones 2 and 3 more accurately. Seeking to expand on this finding, the current study to determine if presenting an introduction of the basic phonetics of tone followed by more specific information on the four Mandarin Chinese tones is more helpful to beginning Mandarin Chinese students than not being presented with any phonetic information. Data was gathered by administering a multiple forced choice experiment in Praat (Boersma and Weenik, 2013) where students listened to a two-syllable word and then identified the tone of the second syllable (This is to control for Beijing Mandarin 3rd tone sandhi, where the first of two consecutive 3rd tones becomes a 2nd tone in certain environments). Tokens for the experiment were recorded by a native speaker in a carrier sentence. There were 16 tonal combinations and 4 syllable shape combinations, leading to 64 unique tokens, each of which was heard twice by participants. The results of this experiment were largely inconclusive, showing no significant difference between the experimental group and the control group. This was most likely due to only being able to present all of the phonetic information for 15 minutes in a single class, due to time constraints on the who still graciously allowed the use of his limited class time. A second experiment was conducted specifically distinguishing tone 3, focusing on using laryngealization, tone 3 having the longest duration, and medium to low falling pitch contour in half-tone sandhi. This time, the experimental group not only correctly identified all four tones, but also all four tones were less confusable overall.
Download or read book The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Language Teaching written by Chris Shei and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-07-22 with total page 791 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Language Teaching defines Chinese language teaching in a pedagogical, historical, and contemporary context. Throughout the volume, teaching methods are discussed, including the traditional China-based approach, and Western methods such as communicative teaching and the immersion program. The Handbook also presents a pedagogical model covering pronunciation, tones, characters, vocabulary, grammar, and the teaching of listening, speaking, reading, and writing. The remaining chapters explore topics of language assessment, technology enhanced instruction, teaching materials and resources, Chinese for specific purposes, classroom implementation, social contexts of language teaching and language teaching policies, and pragmatics and culture. Ideal for scholars and researchers of Chinese language teaching, the Handbook will benefit educators and teacher training programs. This is the first comprehensive volume exploring the growing area of Chinese language pedagogy.
Download or read book On the Perception and Production of Mandarin Tones by Adult English speaking Learners written by Jya-Mei Lu and published by . This book was released on 1992 with total page 502 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Classroom Research on Chinese as a Second Language written by Fangyuan Yuan and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-04-24 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection brings together a series of empirical studies on topics surrounding classrooms of Chinese as a second language (L2) by drawing on a range of theoretical frameworks, methodological strategies, and pedagogical perspectives. Over the past two decades, research on classroom-based second language acquisition (SLA) has emerged and expanded as one of the most important sub-domains in the general field of SLA. In Chinese SLA, however, scarce attention has been devoted to this line of research. With chapters written by scholars in the field of SLA—many of whom are experienced in classroom teaching, teacher education, or program administration in Chinese as a second language—this book helps disentangle the complicated relationships among linguistic targets, pedagogical conditions, assessment tools, learner individual differences, and teacher variables that exist in the so-called "black-box" classrooms of L2 Chinese.
Download or read book The Way of the Linguist written by Steve Kaufmann and published by AuthorHouse. This book was released on 2005-11 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Way of The Linguist, A language learning odyssey. It is now a cliché that the world is a smaller place. We think nothing of jumping on a plane to travel to another country or continent. The most exotic locations are now destinations for mass tourism. Small business people are dealing across frontiers and language barriers like never before. The Internet brings different languages and cultures to our finger-tips. English, the hybrid language of an island at the western extremity of Europe seems to have an unrivalled position as an international medium of communication. But historically periods of cultural and economic domination have never lasted forever. Do we not lose something by relying on the wide spread use of English rather than discovering other languages and cultures? As citizens of this shrunken world, would we not be better off if we were able to speak a few languages other than our own? The answer is obviously yes. Certainly Steve Kaufmann thinks so, and in his busy life as a diplomat and businessman he managed to learn to speak nine languages fluently and observe first hand some of the dominant cultures of Europe and Asia. Why do not more people do the same? In his book The Way of The Linguist, A language learning odyssey, Steve offers some answers. Steve feels anyone can learn a language if they want to. He points out some of the obstacles that hold people back. Drawing on his adventures in Europe and Asia, as a student and businessman, he describes the rewards that come from knowing languages. He relates his evolution as a language learner, abroad and back in his native Canada and explains the kind of attitude that will enable others to achieve second language fluency. Many people have taken on the challenge of language learning but have been frustrated by their lack of success. This book offers detailed advice on the kind of study practices that will achieve language breakthroughs. Steve has developed a language learning system available online at: www.thelinguist.com.
