Teaching of Chinese grammars for Hungarian students and study of teaching-grammars

SHS Web of Conferences, Jan 2016

The author taught foreign students Chinese in the Confucius Institute of EötvösLo-ránd University in Hungary for two years. The mother tongue of Hungarian students is Hungarian in most cases. As Hungarian language (hereinafter referred to as “Hungarian”) is a typical agglutinative language while Chinese is a typical isolating language, there are immeasurably vast differences between the grammatical systems of these two languages. This paper conducted discussion on the problems in teaching Hungarian students Chinese gram-mars mainly based on three aspects: 1. the similarities and differences between study of Chinese grammars and teaching of Chinese grammars for foreign students; 2. brief summary of the grammatical differences between Chinese and Hungarian to understand several grammatical mistakes which Hungarian students always make; 3. some strategies of teaching Hungarian students Chinese grammars.

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Teaching of Chinese grammars for Hungarian students and study of teaching-grammars

SHS Web of Conferences Teaching of Chinese grammars for Hungarian students and study of teaching-grammars Min Zhu 0 0 College of Humanities, Hubei University of Science and Technology , Xianning, Hubei , China The author taught foreign students Chinese in the Confucius Institute of EötvösLoránd University in Hungary for two years. The mother tongue of Hungarian students is Hungarian in most cases. As Hungarian language (hereinafter referred to as “Hungarian”) is a typical agglutinative language while Chinese is a typical isolating language, there are immeasurably vast differences between the grammatical systems of these two languages. This paper conducted discussion on the problems in teaching Hungarian students Chinese grammars mainly based on three aspects: 1. the similarities and differences between study of Chinese grammars and teaching of Chinese grammars for foreign students; 2. brief summary of the grammatical differences between Chinese and Hungarian to understand several grammatical mistakes which Hungarian students always make; 3. some strategies of teaching Hungarian students Chinese grammars. 1 INTRODUCTION While teaching Hungarian students Chinese, I could always hear students saying: ( 1 )*wo xuexi zai xuexiao. (I study Chinese in school.) ( 2 )*wo mama gongzuo meitian xiawu. (My mom works every day in the afternoon.) ( 3 )*ta you yi shu. (She has one book.) ( 4 )*ta shi zhiyuan de gongsi. (He is staff’s company.) To solve these problems, common sense of Chinese grammars must be referred to. It is unfortunate that many TCSL (Teaching Chinese as a Second Language) teachers are radical in Chinese grammar teaching—some teachers completely abandon grammatical knowledge and correct the syntax error made by students one by one while some teachers pay too much attention to grammars. In the former situation, students may remember the correct syntax of this sentence, but they may make the same mistake in another sentence of the same type. In the latter situation, no class can be given without grammar and students may get confused as a result. Therefore, this paper conducted discussion on the problems in teaching Hungarian students Chinese grammars mainly based on three aspects: 1. the similarities and differences between study of Chinese grammars and teaching of Chinese grammars for foreign students; 2. brief summary of the grammatical differences between Chinese and Hungarian to understand several grammatical mistakes which Hungarian students always make; 3. some strategies of teaching Hungarian students Chinese grammars. 2 RELEVANCE AND DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CHINESE GRAMMARS AND GRAMMARS OF TEACHING CHINESE AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE For the question of whether to teach grammar in the teaching of Chinese as a second language, countless predecessors have given positive answers. This is decided by the principle of second language acquisition. In the teaching of Chinese as a second language, the teaching objects are students who already have their mother tongue as the first language. If the students are only told to stimulate and receive no teaching of grammar, they will only get half the achievement with twice the effort and lose interest in learning Chinese. First of all, let’s take a look at the relations between Chinese grammar and grammar in the teaching of Chinese as a second language. Study of Chinese grammar lays the foundation in the teaching of Chinese as a second language. People who know little grammar have no idea of how to start teaching Chinese. Just as what De-Xi Zhu (1989) said, “The teaching of Chinese as a second language must rely on Chinese study; or it will be like a tree without origin or roots.” “The reason why there’re many questions cannot be clearly explained in the class is because fundamental research is in shortage.” “It shall be emphasized that Chinese study is the foundation of teaching Chinese as a second language. It is a reserve force. Without Chinese study, the teaching of Chinese as a second language cannot make any progress.” Quan Li (2003) once directly pointed out that “It is not decided by our will or responsibility of whether to conduct grammatical study. Grammatical study is a must…in the long run; grammatical study is the fundamental way to improve the level and efficiency of the teaching of Chinese as a second language.” Is it true that grammar used in the teaching of Chinese as a seconding language is the same with Chinese grammar? Of course not! We always say that experts of Chinese grammar may not be able to give a good lesson on Chinese for foreigner due to three main reasons: 1. Although study of Chinese grammar has made great progress in recent years, the achievement that can be referred to in the teaching of Chinese as a second language is far away from being sufficient. This reason can also interpret why there are many linguistic phenomena we can’t explain. 2. The study directions and study objects about the study of Chinese grammar and gram (...truncated)


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Min Zhu. Teaching of Chinese grammars for Hungarian students and study of teaching-grammars, SHS Web of Conferences, 2016, 24, DOI: 10.1051/shsconf/20162402010