What makes a good Chinese lesson

[Guest realmayo]

That's not what my gut tells me.

[roddy]

As the perfectly clear explanations don't seem to be working, lets try an analogy:

A novice driver might take a car for a test drive and be perfectly happy - it got him adequately from A to B. What more could you want in a car? His mechanic friend however notices that the brakes are squishy, it corners funny, and as this was a test drive, it should have gone back to A rather than stopping at B.

Incidentally the idea that I was demanding all language classes conform to a 55 minute template of my choosing is so laughable I'm not even going to address it, bar calling it laughable.

[陳德聰]

Something tells me analogy is also not going to work, because in your analogy the novice driver used his instincts to tell him that it was a good test drive. ;)

But the question is...

If I make a car analogy and my teacher doesn't get it, is it still a good lesson?

[imron]

Imron, ask yourself this, when you take lessons, do you not rely on instincts?

With anything, I listen to my instincts, and then I try to analyse the situation in more detail to figure out why my instincts are telling me this. From there I can gain a deeper understanding of the situation and also determine what if anything needs to changed/improved, or what I should try to replicate in the future. Gaining a more thorough appreciation of the different factors involved also helps my instincts provide a better response the next time I encounter a similar (or sometimes even a dissimilar) situation.

There's nothing wrong with listening to your instincts as a first step, unless you just stop and leave it at that. Following the matter up with more detailed thought and analysis can reap all sorts of gains if done well. This is not just for Chinese lessons, but for all things in life.

[Guest realmayo]

There's nothing wrong with listening to your instincts as a first step, unless you just stop and leave it at that

Well, up to a point maybe. But consider the view that in certain circumstances your instincts will always be wrong. In which case I'd say there's nothing wrong with listening out for your instincts, but not to them.

[zhouhaochen]

I think there are some basics, like:

1) planning the class properly

2) choosing the right materials (book) and topics beforehand

3) a teacher who has a thorough understanding of grammar, the specific difficulties a learner of Mandarin will face, tones etc. (through experience or study)

4) to be able to lead a student through the "Chinese learning journey" - which might involve for example stopping students to try to speak with a Beijing accent before they have acquired the ability to know when 儿 and specific phrases can be used and when not; to pay attention to tones right from the start etc.

5) knowledge and ability to explain characters

There is a whole lot more, but I think those 5 are true in almost all cases.

And then there is the ability to connect with students and make them enjoy class and love the language (lets face it - if you dont love doing it, who would ever spend all that time learning Mandarin?). I think that part a student can feel with their "gut", but not necessairly the others, especially for someone who just started.

It is "relatively" (I say relatively with care here - nothing is really easy when it comes to teaching Chinese) easy to make a student feel happy with a teacher. It is much harder to get him to make progress and make sure he will not curse himself for not having learned the tones properly at the beginning in two years.

Another point mentioned I think is obvious, but sometimes not enough paid attention to: there is no perfect teacher or teaching method. It depends on what a students aim is (if someone wants to learn survival Chinese, characters are just not a priority / if they want to intensively study and reach fluency, tones are curicial to be paid a lot of attention to at the beginning when picking up habits), personality (someone who knows a lot but is afraid to form a sentence in Chinese, should be corrected in a very different manner to someone who speaks all the time but tries to convince himself that tones are a luxury he can do without) and daily "form" of a student (you cant teach someone who just finished a 10h work day the same way as someone who just got out of bed after a good nights sleep).

One point I do disagree with some of the posters above: That a teacher should correct every mistake. This is often seen as a "test" if the teacher pays attention and really helps to improve. I do not think that should always be the case.

Running a Chinese Language school, I do study plans for students every day and whenever you ask someone if they want to be corrected when they make a mistake, they usually say "yes, always correct me". I used to think thats how it should be done too. We tried that. It is simply not possible.

When for example a beginner tries to form their first sentences and a teacher corrects him for every wrong tone in that sentence it will be very disheartening as it will take a long time to get a sentence 100% right for that kind of student. He most likely will not try again. In a group if every tone gets corrected, students will either not get past the first paragraph of the text, some students will start to resent whoever speaks, because correcting his mistakes will take up half their class or students will stop speaking alltogether and become afraid of using what they learned.

A teacher also needs to know when to let something slip. That doesnt mean that class is just a time to chat, but it is an art to know when to correct and when not. One possible way of looking at it, is to correct and give the chance to try again for the topic being learned at the moment, while being more lenient on the other subjects. So for example when you just learned 了 yesterday and use it wrong today, you should correct. If you are 来and去 the wrong way round, but never studied the difference before, it might not be necessary to interrupt a good effort by a student to speak Chinese.

Funnily enough, I just spent 2hrs with our headteacher discussing this when I saw this post.

[roddy]

One point I do disagree with some of the posters above: That a teacher should correct every mistake. This is often seen as a "test" if the teacher pays attention and really helps to improve. I do not think that should always be the case.

Which posters, exactly? Having scanned the topic twice I can't see anyone saying that.

[Gharial]

I am planning to take some free lessons, but what is important during a lesson? ..... I want to focus on daily conversational Chinese, to make life in China somewhat easier.

I wonder what a class will teach you regarding the very basics and daily Chinese that a good self-study course, plus a dictionary and maybe a grammar book, couldn't (and couldn't teach you much more efficiently!). IMHO, taking classes or tutors (whether free or not) only really makes any sense once you know a thing or two (the knowledge will help you relax a bit and acquire more, and also help you to spot any questionable practices), and as you're now "immersed", it isn't like there's a shortage of native speakers to (try) talk(ing) to! (NB: Apologies if you've already tried a good book and found it failed to quite ignite or kick-start things).

Anyway, I could tell you a bit about TEFL practices that don't always quite add up, and am hoping that TCFL hasn't picked up too many of these.

[zhouhaochen]

@roddy: "corrections" comes up several times in the posts before, which is why I caught up on it. At second reading though, none of them state that "always correcting" is important, so I guess my comment with regard to the previous discussion on that point was not that relevant.

It is something that I come across a lot when doing student's assesments and have a rather strong opinion about so I guess I was more replying to what other people said to me during other occasions and not what was said here in this thread.

The point still stands though.

[roddy]

Yeah, jumping on every error is not wise.

Anyway, I could tell you a bit about TEFL practices that don't always quite add up,

Oh go on then....

[Gharial]

OK, I'll try to come up with a considered critique of much so-called communicative practice, but in the meantime one could do worse than read some of Englishdroid's articles, which apart from being frequently pretty funny, are often closer to the bone than many ELT professionals would care to admit:
http://sites.google..../englishdroid2/

 

Edit: I had a go (I mean at giving a considered critique of some TEFL practices) here http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/44890-youll-never-believe-these-8-incredible-signs-your-chinese-teacher-isnt-very-good/?p=337939 , but I don't think Roddy liked it as it was in response to stuff HE'd written LOL.

[amandagmu]

Reviving this topic as I've noticed the number one that has never been easy for me (but easier when in a Chinese-speaking country) and for which very, very few teachers make a concerted effort to help with: tones.

Seriously, guys, tones are important and the only teachers who have ever really pushed it were the ones I had at ICLP. As in, if I said it wrong I had to repeat it until I got it right. Of course they realized when to let up just a wee bit depending on my frustration levels, but sometimes we even had extra classes devoted to tones. (I guess you do get something extra for all that money...)

I know so many people living in China who keep going full-steam ahead without being stopped and in most cases I blame their crappy teachers and/or teachers who are just too lenient. I know, because when I took classes last time in Beijing to work on conversation I had to make it clear on multiple occasions, to multiple teachers, that I wanted to work on tones while reading... not easy, really an exercise in humility. Most annoying was that sometimes the teacher would just get frustrated with me, ha! and would rather just do something else not involving tonal practice. That's seriously a shame.

EDIT: I also want to add that, after just now having read the whole thread, there is something called "differentiated learning" which means the obvious - different people learn in different ways (albeit there are many teachers who have never heard of it.... ). So, the best teachers I've had would be the ones who figured out how to adapt their teaching style to my needs and personality. Judging from the 20-25 Chinese teachers I've had over the years, the best ones I've had did that so well I was almost unconscious of it at the time. Sometimes I only figured out months later how much I had actually learned in class... as Roddy said, there is also the need to evaluate progress. What's always worked best for me (I don't know why) is to study 2-3 months intensely (this would include some level of "homework") and then totally take off a few weeks from class (rest the brain, take a vacation, watch more English language movies/TV than Chinese language, ETC). When you go back, you should surprise yourself in being much stronger than when you began the classes. If not, time to switch.

[abcdefg]

#32 --

What's always worked best for me (I don't know why) is to study 2-3 months intensely (this would include some level of "homework") and then totally take off a few weeks from class (rest the brain, take a vacation, watch more English language movies/TV than Chinese language, ETC). When you go back, you should surprise yourself in being much stronger than when you began the classes.

That works best for me too. I generally travel during my "off" time. Since the travel is in China, I am still "informally immersed."

Couldn't agree more about the importance of tones. I have a suspicion by now, though I have not seen any supporting research, that if I say the wrong word with the right tone I'm more likely to be understood in rapid speech than if I say the right word with the wrong tones.

[Gharial]

if I say the wrong word with the right tone I'm more likely to be understood in rapid speech than if I say the right word with the wrong tones

By wrong ("wrong") word, you mean you get into roughly the intended ballpark with an approximate substitute or paraphrase, abcdefg?

[abcdefg]

# 34 -- @Gharial -- Sorry, I didn't explain that well. Wasn't talking about a substitute or paraphrase. What I meant was that, if in conversation with a native speaker, I get one of the vowels or the consonants in a word wrong, there seems to still be a pretty good chance of being understood if I have the tones correct. Of course, I'm not advocating doing that, and I realize that context can supply a lot of hints the listener can use to "decipher" my incorrect utterance.

I can remember frustrating situations from a while back when I would try to say a sentence with a simple and common word like 茶 or 水 and not be understood because of incorrect tones. But when I was at that same stage of proficiency, I could say "tou4fu" in a sentence instead of "dou4fu" and still be understood.

Not sure if this makes sense. Wish I could think of better examples.

[Gharial]

Ahh, sound-mangling aka a learner's gargling. We've probably all done a bit of that (and mine, thankfully before the internet was born, otherwise I might've been tempted to post something embarrassing!).

I was trying to think of some examples myself. I can now imagine you crawling out of a desert and provoking consternation by croaking for some "tea" rather than plain "water".

If the worst comes to the worst, maybe we could just borrow some of Webmagents' "proxy mate's hounds"?