This small change will bring big differences to those seeking to work in China. For international students who are planning their education in China, they are free to find a job after graduation in China. For China’s universities, they will become competitive internationally at the collegiate level.

We will introduce some top China’s universities and China Study programs. If you are planning to attend some courses or work on your degrees in China, we hope that this information can be of some help.

Top 10 University Rankings in China

The USNews has published their annual report on Chinese university rankings in 2015, including those in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan. Here is what they listed:

The ranking may changes by year, however Beida and Qinghua in Beijing, Fudan and Jiaoda in Shanghai have a well-known reputation in the education world. In mainland China, there are also qualifying numbers for universities that reach a certain standard set by the China’s Ministry of Education. These numbers are “985” and “211”. “985” Universities are top schools within the country and there are only thirty nine “985” Universities. The title “985” originates from a speech delivered by former president Jiang Zemin in May of 1998 for Peking University’s 100th Anniversary. After the speech, the Chinese government launched the “Project 985” which evaluated universities’ all-round performance and invested a huge of amount of money to China’s best universities in order to push them towards the “World First Class” University.

Before “Project 985”, the Chinese government had launched “Project 211” from 1991 to 1992 to establish China’s top 100 Universities in the 21st century. Technically, all “985” universities are “211” universities, but it isn’t the same vice versa. The students who graduated from 985 or 211 Universities enjoy obvious or some potential advantages in the job market given their academic prestige.

Top China Study Program in China’s Universities

If you are planning to join in a China study program in Mainland China, you should first look for one in the top ten or 985 universities. For example, the famous Yenching Academy China Study Master Program of Peking University which offers courses from Chinese history and culture, to real-time issues in China’s development. The program’s core courses are:

• Introduction to China Studies
• China in Transition
• China’s Social Science Research
• Formation of Chinese Civilization
• Development of Chinese Civilization
• Chinese Ethics and Value
• Modern Chinese or Ancient Chinese Language Courses are also required
• In Shanghai Fudan University also offer various Chinese & Culture Immersion Programs .

These study programs are generally language and culture balanced. The language courses provide Chinese classes with all levels from beginners to advanced learners. The culture courses include Brief Introduction to China (English instructed) and Cultural workshops such as calligraphy, painting and Kungfu.

In addition the language and culture, there are speeches on various modern China Study topics given. As an example, the following is a curriculum of one summer program of 2015.

1. Traditional culture in China
2. China’s political system
3. Cross straits relationship
4. China’s Dream and the future of China
5. China’s economic growth
6. Development of Shanghai Free Trade Zone
7. Technology advancement in China
8. China’s household registration system
9. The impact of globalization and modernization to the development of China’s society and culture

However, if you plan to learn Chinese Language in China, you need to know that some good options for institutions may not be in the top ten or “985” Universities category. Since many good language degree programs come from universities that specialize in language training, their quality might not be reflected in the overall rankings. For example, the BLCU, Beijing Language and Culture University located in the center of the universe “Wudaokou”, also known for its ridiculous large number of international students and high real estate price. BLCU is the only university in China that specialized in Chinese language and culture education to foreign students. Since it’s founding in 1962, the university has trained over 150,000 foreign students from 176 countries and regions. It has a full range of cutting-edge Chinese language and culture studies program and various graduate students programs. Some of them are:

• International Politics
• Education of Politics
• Curriculum Design and Language Teaching Theories
• Literature and Art Studies
• Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
• Chinese Philology and Language Studies
• Chinese Classical Textual Philology
• Chinese Classical Literature
• Modern and Contemporary Chinese Literature
• Languages and Literature of Chinese Ethnic Groups
• Comparative Literature and World Literature
• Asian and African Languages and Literature
• Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
• Teaching Chinese to Speakers of Other Languages
• English-Chinese Translation and Interpreting
• French-Chinese Translation and Interpreting

In order to look for more information on China Universities or China Study Program, you can check on the webpage of Study in China of China Scholarship Council: http://en.csc.edu.cn/

I hope this article was helpful in understanding the collegiate education in China. If you have any questions, you are also welcomed to leave a comment here, and I’d be happy to give more suggestions.

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#1 The Natural Approach

In the second language-learning field, it’s puzzling why nearly all children can successfully learn their mother language quickly while adult learners barely acquire language even if they learned for a whole life. Some people believe since an adult is smarter than child, then the problem must come from their teacher. The teacher teaches grammar rules incorrectly, they should just teach their adult learners in a natural way as their mother did.

Terrell and Krashen’s publication, The Natural Approach (1983) outlines three basic principles of this approach:

ŸFocus of instruction is on communication rather than its form.

ŸSpeech production comes slowly and is never forced.

ŸEarly speech goes through natural progression (From yes or no responses, one- word answers, lists of words, short phrases, complete sentences).

In other words, this theory believes that language should be learned naturally over time and practice. For teachers, it means just simply give students enough in-put before asking for out-put. For students, he or she should try to guess and use the language rather than analyze it.

Doesn’t this approach sound amazing? However, we are not children anymore.

#2 The Classic Approach

Back to the old times, the Europeans widely learned classic literatures in Greek and Latin. Since the aim to learn these languages is limited to reading ancient classic literatures as formal education rather than use it as a modern language in daily life communication. According this belief, students only need is to learn grammatical rules and words and then apply those rules by translating texts word-for-word. Hence this approach is also known as the Grammar-Translation Approach. Generally speaking, this approach follows a very straight procedure.

This approach was the standard way that languages were taught in schools from the 17th to 19th century and is still in use today in hybrid forms in many different situations. I bet your teachers have asked you questions like “How do you say this in Chinese?” or “Could you translate these sentences into Chinese?”

This approach is acknowledged as a classic and even a work of art because of its simplicity. However, we live in a world that changed since 17^th century.

#3 The Audio-lingual Approach

As new technology such as the train and telephone developed in 19^th century, people gain more chances to travel to foreign countries or talk to foreigners. The ability to listen and speak foreign languages gradually overmasters the noble knowledge on classic languages. A Russian psychologist named Pavlov claimed that human learning is no difference from a dog. He believed learning is simply a result of “Stimulus-Response”.

Meanwhile, the outbreak of World War II created the need of soldiers that could speak and listen certain target language speeches. Language teachers who were desperate for a quick approach to teach listening and speaking took this behaviorism theory almost without any hesitation and formed the Audio-Lingual approach. This approach emphasizes the skills of listening and speaking. Some of its distinct features are:

ŸThe structure of a language can be condensed into a limited number of basic sentence patterns.

ŸThe way to acquire these sentence patterns is repetition of dialogues about daily situations.

ŸTeachers will drill these repetitions and the students imitate.

ŸThe correct answer got the rewards, the wrong answer got the punishment.

This approach is still adored by many “crazy” teachers who treat their students like animals. Surprisingly, lots of students enjoy this type of learning.

#4 The Communicative Approach

With the end of the Word War II and the advent of the world common market, a large population of people needed to learn a foreign language for work or personal reasons. Foreign language study ceased to be confined to the elite academies or to serve certain aims in specific situation. Almost all children in secondary school had the opportunity to study foreign languages. They learned foreign languages in order to communicate with their classmates, the community, and the foreign society that they live in.

Communication is very similar to a jigsaw puzzle. Different person has different pieces of the picture. You will talk and exchange information and get the whole picture right. This process is also how the language education experts now see the nature of second language learning: language should be treated as a tool to communicate rather than a system of signs and rules. Students don’t learn how to use the language; they learn the language when they use it. Some techniques recommended by the communicative approach include:

• Role-play/Pair-work
• Interviews/Surveys
• Games
• Information gap activity
• Language exchanges

A thorough application of this approach is to assign students perform real tasks in life in foreign language rather than merely stimulated practice in classroom. However, it faces a high risk of losing the control of class and students.

#5 The Post-method Approach

In the history of teaching modern languages formally in school, researchers and curriculum designers keep trying to find and apply more effective methods. However, they gradually realized that there is no such a thing called the best method or one pattern that fits all. In fact, a particular aspect of language, such as writing or speaking requires a unique way to teach while an individual learner prefers a personalized learning stretegy. Hence, Allweright(1991) claimed “the death of Method”. Alternatively, Kumaravadivelu (2003) proposed the conception of “Beyond Method” with a frame of 10 macro-strategies that are helpful to learn language in the post-method era.

1. Maximum learning opportunities
2. Facilitate common interaction
3. Minimize common mistakes
4. Activate intuitive hands on learning
5. Foster language awareness
6. Contextualize language information
7. Integrate language skills
8. Promote learner autonomy
9. Ensure social relevance
10. Raise cultural awareness

Conclusion

After looking at these multiple approaches to learning a second language, you can decide on which you think works best for you. Though there is no right way to learning the language, you can take strategies from multiples approaches that best suit your learning style. The important key is that you find what works best for you when it comes to learning Mandarin. Good luck and I will see you next time.

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In January, I wrote an article on How to find a really good Chinese textbook. Hope that was helpful for you. Today, I’d like to continue on to talk about how to find a really good Chinese teacher.

Here are some facts:

I have many foreign friends who are learning Chinese Mandarin and complain to me that Chinese is too difficult to learn, even though they have private tutors to help them. At that time, I always tell them that they are so right and I suggest finding a professional teacher to teach them if they want to learn Chinese seriously.

The fact is the Chinese language is a far-distance language from Indo-European language for most western learners. This language asks for more effort and hours to achieve a functionally native proficiency, or the superior level according to ACTFL-OPI (American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages- Oral Proficiency Interview). Here is ACTFL-OPI chart language acquisition.

To reach the superior level, more hours are needed for a western learner to learn Chinese than one who is learning Spanish. With more detail, we will see the durations of language programs in American Defense language Institute where 24 foreign languages were taught. The following scale shows the duration of formal instruction (25 class hours a week) of these language programs for English speakers.

I giving you the above example not to quench your fire to learn Chinese, but want to tell you that the truth that learning Chinese language is very challenging. It is not a smart idea to learn Chinese from the Rosetta Stone or Chinese for Dummies. In order to save time, it is worth to pay a good and qualified teacher to help you learn Chinese language.

Here are some standards

There are billions of Chinese native speakers in the world and finding a good Chinese teacher doesn’t seem to be a difficult problem. However, this thought is a very big misunderstanding. For a long time, teaching Chinese was not seen as a professional skill until 1981, when the Beijing Language and Culture University started to enroll college students who majored in teaching Chinese as a second language (also known as Duiwai Hanyu,对外汉语). These Chinese native students studied Chinese Language and culture knowledge, foreign language (mostly English) and the methodologies to teach Chinese to foreigners. In short, their training goal is to teach foreigner to speak Chinese in the most efficient way. When you look for a Chinese teacher, do firstly look for someone with the academic background of Duiwai Hanyu.

In 2007, the China National Office for Teaching Chinese as Foreign Language (also known as hanban 汉办) designed a criteria for international Chinese teacher qualification with 5 modules and 10 standards. Here is what Hanban developed as standards for Chinese teachers.

Here are some Checking References:

If power in your hand to choose a Chinese teacher, you may need to go through a simple checklist rather than the general standards above. I personally use some references to distinguish amateur Chinese teachers from experienced ones. Here are 10 Yes/No questions that I use for my own evaluations.
Q1：Does the teacher has an accent?
Q2: Does the teacher speak too fast?
Q3: Does the teacher often say “Do you know XXX pattern”?
Q4: Does the teacher often say “Do you understand my question”?
Q5: Does the teacher often say “That’s just how we Chinese say it”?
Q6: Does the teacher often ask student to “make sentence”?
Q7: Does the teacher often ask student to “read the text after me”?
Q8: Does the teacher use too much translation or medium language?
Q9: Does the teacher speak more than you?
Q10: Does the teacher often butt in and correct your reply?

If your Chinese teacher has “yes” answers, you probably need to reevaluate your decision. However, it’s your time and money so please choose as you believe is best. You are always welcomed back to DigMandarin.com to meet some really good and qualified teachers here.

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Why a Textbook?

Here are some reasons why a textbook is needed in most situations.

• It can serve as a syllabus
• It provides ready-made teaching contents and learning tasks
• It is a cheap way of providing learning materials
• It allows learners to review material and preview other lessons.
• A textbook is a framework, which organize and regulate the study times.
• A learner without a textbook is often out of focus and teacher-dependent.
• For novice teachers, it provides security, guidance, and support

However, different students have different needs. Topics and materials in a textbook may not be relevant or interesting to all. But we should always keep in mind that any textbook should be chosen carefully and used judiciously.

How to Choose a Good Chinese Textbook?

While the quantity of Chinese textbooks has increased dramatically in recent years, it is difficult to select a good textbook. However, according to English teaching experts Hutchinson and Waters, evaluating textbook is a straightforward and analytical “four steps matching process: matching needs to available solutions” (Hutchinson and Waters 1987:97).

Hutchinson and Waters defined criteria based on the aspects of audience, aims, content, methodology and others to total to 21 items. This process can be used to choose a Chinese textbook. The common-core criteria and analysis questions can be summarized as following:

Does the Textbook Follow a Specific Teaching Approach?

• Sharing of a vision (theory or approach) about:
  • The nature of language
  • The nature of learning
  • How the theory can be put to applied use

How is the Content Presented?

• Stating purpose(s) and objective(s)
  • For the total course
  • For individual units
• Selection and its rationale
  • Coverage
  • Grading
  • Organization
  • Sequencing
• Satisfaction of the syllabus
  • To the teacher
    • Providing a guide book
    • Giving advice on the methodology
      • Giving theoretical orientations
      • Key to the exercises
      • Supplementary materials
• To the student
  • Unit-by-unit instruction
  • Design (relevant, free from unnecessary details, colorful, etc.)
  • Periodic revisions
  • Workbook
  • Exercises and activities
    • In the classroom
    • Homework
    • Sample exercises with clear instructions
    • Varied and numerous
• Periodic test sections
• Accompanying audio-visual aids

Physical Make-up and Others

• Appropriate Size & weight
• Attractive layout
• Durability
• High quality of editing and publishing
• Appropriate title
• Acceptable price

Any Textbook Recommendations?

I have taught Mandarin Chinese in Beijing, Shanghai and in Kentucky for over ten years and have used many of textbooks in different situations. I cannot say which specific one is the best because it is situation-sensitive. However, here are ones that I personally prefer and have used.

《汉语会话301句》 Conversational Chinese 301

This textbook claims it is “the most popular textbook for foreigners all over the world”. The Beijing Language and Culture University Press first published this book in 1990 and it unexpectedly became a star item. The main reason for its popularity was how well it fit the need of a short-term course. This book uses 300 basic sentences to build up conversations in various daily situations. Learners could master simple Chinese sentences in a short period of time.

If you want to learn some survival Chinese before you journey to China next month, and you happen to have 1 or 2 hours’ time to learn 10 sentences per day, take a look at this textbook.

《快乐汉语》 Kuaile Hanyu

Kuaile Hanyu literally translates to Happy Chinese, is a set of Chinese teaching materials specially compiled for teenagers. Kuaile Hanyu is initially designed for Britain middle school student aged from 11 to 16. Therefore, it suits the psychological level and learning requirements of young learners. It has fun content while it uses few and simple words to covers topics of school and daily life. The entire set consists of a student’s book, a teacher’s book, a workbook, flash cards, wall charts and CDs. Hence practical choice for teachers and students.

《当代中文》 Contemporary Chinese

This teaching book set consists of 4 volumes, each of which includes a textbook, teacher’s guide, workbook, practice test book and additional reading materials. It takes the task-based teaching theory where these textbooks integrate trainings on speaking, listening, reading and writing skills; while focuses on difficult and important key languages points. It is a balance between basic listening, speaking, reading and writing skills as well as the ability to communicate effectively in Chinese. Besides English version, it was also translated into French, Russian, Arabic, Thai, Serbian, Filipino versions and so on. This textbook widely used among Confucius Institutes and overseas Chinese schools.

《环球汉语》 Encounters: Chinese Language and Culture

Encounter is a very unique textbook that I am using it this semester in Fudan-UC Exchange Student Program. I feel that it is more like a TV series rather than a textbook. Accompanied with this textbook are hours of video materials, comprising dramatic episodes, cultural segments, and animations all shot in China by Hollywood producers. It immerses learners in the Chinese language and culture through video episodes.

*In Dec. 2014, The Confucius Institute Headquarter reports that 54 languages and 1300 kinds of Chinese textbooks have been published in last decade.

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