Chinese colloquial speech course

Author: Dai Xixin, Wang Jing (editors)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2001-07-01
Features: "A Practical Chinese Course for Oral Communication" is a supplementary textbook for the first-year "A Course in Chinese" (Volume 3). The book consists of 20 lessons, each comprising text, vocabulary, usage notes, and exercises, requiring 2-3 class hours per lesson. Oral communication classes are single-skill training courses, with the goal of cultivating students' oral communication skills. This ability is specifically demonstrated by:
1. Communicating in accordance with the patterns of spoken Chinese language interaction;
2. Using spoken Chinese language in communication.
Based on this understanding of the nature of oral communication classes, the teaching principles we adopted in the compilation are: centering learning on discourse and training with the aim of expression.
Centering learning on discourse
Learning discourse means not only studying words and syntactic structures in speech activities but also understanding their communicative functions in these activities, as well as the ways and patterns of and connection between discourse segments. This textbook presents situational dialogues centered around a foreign student and a Chinese family. This approach makes it easy to arrange scenarios and topics commonly encountered by foreign students while also reflecting the communicative behaviors, values, emotional expressions, and habits of Chinese people. As a result, the speech behaviors and cultural customs of the characters in the textbook appear more authentic and natural.
Training with the aim of expression
The premise of expression is the comprehension of inputted verbal information. Therefore, the first step in expression training should be the training of comprehension skills, so we recommend giving students the opportunity to listen to the texts first. In the arrangement of text content, we always focus on one or two scenarios, designing two to three dialogue segments. Each segment includes four to eight turns, making the focus clear and concentrating on a single topic to facilitate students' understanding and memorization.
The second step in expression training is question-and-answer, which can be conducted between the teacher and students or among students themselves. This approach not only enhances students' comprehension but also trains their conversational (dialogue) skills based on that understanding.
The third step in expression training is narration, which involves converting the dialogues (dialogue) in the text into monologues to train students' ability to express themselves in longer passages.
The fourth step is guiding students from the scenarios in the text to real-life situations, encouraging them to flexibly apply the language knowledge and speech skills learned in class, thereby cultivating their communicative abilities.
The "Usage Notes" in this textbook include two sections: vocabulary usage and expression methods. The explanations of vocabulary usage are not exhaustive but are designed to be practical for the lesson at hand. The expression methods list common expressions based on the main functional items of the lesson for teachers and students to choose from. All exercises are in dialogue form, requiring students to appreciate the context and communicative function of each dialogue pair.