The aim of Chinese language education is to develop four linguistic functions - listening, speaking, reading, and writing. However, Chinese education influenced by structuralism and audio-lingual approach has been focused on a spoken language and spea...
The aim of Chinese language education is to develop four linguistic functions - listening, speaking, reading, and writing. However, Chinese education influenced by structuralism and audio-lingual approach has been focused on a spoken language and speaking-oriented education, and writing has been regarded as a supplementary of speaking. Recently, we are interested in a written language as a cognitive theory is rising, and we insist that we should try to consider writing as a different type of communication tool and teach Chinese writing by making the most of its own characteristics.
The former Chinese teaching can be classified into two types: 'Controlled Writing' which are emphasized on an accuracy of every single sentence and 'Free Writing' which deals with structure and framework of text. But, we find that separate application to teaching Chinese writing cannot contribute to the ultimate purpose of writing. In other words, it is insufficient, especially in developing practical writing abilities, for students to keep practicing sentences automatically for accurate writing through 'Controlled Writing' and to make students write without any concrete instructions or help and correct mistakes according to 'Free Writing'. Recently, we insist on the necessity of new types of teaching methods in writing and try to raise several technique alternative to former ones. The characteristics of these methods is to recognize the communicative function of writing by developing writing ability not through a single sentence but through a text with certain purpose and to enable students to use proper words by setting certain conditions when they practice writing. The present writing instruction in high school Chinese course in Korea does not rise above the level of 'Controlled Writing', and we does not offer any proper teaching materials on writing in a high school Chinese textbook.
The purpose of this study is to show a model that can teach writing by using present high school Chinese textbooks according to a new teaching method of writing. The model consists of several parts - meaningful dictations, improvements of communication ability through writing, a writing by command and instruction activities, sentence-linking practice, writing a story, and descriptions. Therefore, this study verify if each high school Chinese textbook is able to provide students with successive writing types for studying writing more meaningful and effective. Besides, through high school freshmen survey, this study find out the methods that can communicate each other more easily in Chinese language by balancing with four functions of Chinese functions.