中国語教育の中の「四声」教授法について

要旨

China's recent open foreign policy and her accompanying rapid economic developments have generated a demand for people proficient in Chinese. Thus, teaching the Chinese language has become one of the faster-growing programs in Japanese universities. However, present Chinese language teaching at many Japanese universities has hot been able to answer the general demand for students with a certain level of proficiency in Mandarin Chinese, the official language of the People's Republic of China and Taiwan. One factor responsible for this inadequacy is the application of inappropriate teaching methods for the "four tones" of Chinese in the classroom. It is crucial for learners to grasp the "four tones" in order to communicate in Chinese. But, mastering the "four tones" is one of the most difficult tasks for Japanese students learning Chinese. This study focuses on the problem of teaching the "four tones" using traditional teaching methods in many Japanese universities. It tries to analyze its problematic areas, and introduces a new approach to teaching the "four tones" based on 'association chains.'