APPLICATION OF SOME RESEA

久爱奥鹏晓林

Chapter I
INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY
      Teaching Chinese to Speakers of Other Languages (TCSOL), a branch of second language (L2) acquisition (SLA), has become a field itself after more than two thousand years of development and growth, especially under the leadership of the Communist Party since the birth of New China in 1949. According to Professor Xun Liu (刘珣, 2006), the development of TCSOL in New China can be divided in two eras with the first period from 1950s to 1970s and the second since the 1980s. The latter has witnessed enormous change in TCSOL. Teaching Chinese to speakers of other languages can be traced back to as early as Hang dynasty with some Chinese language learners from ethnic minority groups and other countries.  Business and trading had attracted more and more foreigners to China for the Chinese language and culture before Qing Dynasty. The number of Chinese language learners from other countries encountered significant decrease in the late Qing Dynasty and earlier twentieth century due to the invasion of China by the European imperialists. The establishment of a few Chinese language instruction and research sectors in 1950s and 1960s signified a new beginning of TCSOL. However, not until three decades ago, did TCSOL have the opportunity to grow rapidly. There have been a great number of foreign students coming to China to study the language. Some of them have even completed the studies in different fields in Chinese and returned to their home countries. With the demand of learning the Chinese language and the strategic development plan of the Chinese government, teaching Chinese programs have been initiated and expanded all over the world for the past thirty years. More than 300 Confucius Institutes (CI) have sprouted in Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas. There are many CIs in the United States (US).  Although most CIs in the US were originated at college level for adult learners, some have taken the Chinese language instruction to public schools.
      Under the umbrella of TCSOL exists several branches of the field depending upon where the teaching or learning takes place. Teaching Chinese as Second Language (TCSL) includes teaching the Chinese language to foreigners and ethnic minority groups in China whereas Teaching Chinese as Foreign Language (TCFL) encompasses providing the language instruction in places other than China to overseas-born Chinese and learners from non-native Chinese speaking countries. Teaching Chinese in the US stems from TCFL.

Statement of the Problem
      According to Professor Xun Liu (2006) and other experts in TCSOL, research on teaching methodologies in China is in its very early stage. TCSOL teachers are not well equipped before going to classrooms, especially in public schools in the US, with instructional strategies and methodologies. In addition, the observations by the researcher working with some TCSOL teachers indicate that the lack of understanding of local culture and preparation in teaching strategies and methodologies lead to an issue of classroom management. These factors may have caused psychological stress experienced by the TCSOL teachers and less effectiveness of the classroom instruction. The study was to investigate the effect of professional development on research-based practices in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) applied to TCSOL. The professional development on TESOL-to-TCSOL strategies and methods was provided to the TCSOL teachers in the study in order to improve classroom management, students’ participation, and consequently the effectiveness of the instruction.