A Study On The Teaching Methods Of Synonyms In Primary Chinese For Foreign Students

The teaching of synonyms is an important part of the Chinese as a foreign language teaching. International students learning Chinese as a foreign language cannot avoid learning Chinese synonyms as there are a large number of synonyms in the Chinese language. They are bound to run into more synonyms and make more errors as their Chinese vocabulary increases. It is relatively easy for Chinese language students at the intermediate and advanced levels to learn to differentiate synonyms as they possess a large vocabulary and have a deeper understanding of Chinese. The existing research literatures on the methods of teaching synanyms are all aimed at--students at the intermediate or advanced levels, so teachers may get relatively more referential materials to look at when preparing their lessons. However, few studies are conducted about whether it is necessary for students at the elementary level to learn to differentiate synonyms and about what teaching methods would be more appropriate.This paper reports the study on teaching of Chinese synonyms at the elementary Chinese language classes for intenational students at Yunnan University. The study has found that the textbooks used for these classes contain2,083words in total, among which there are239groups of synonyms. The number of synonyms proves the necessity for students to be able to differentiate these synonyms at the elementary level. However, very little explanation and few exercises on synonyms are provided in the textbooks. At the same time, only30%of the20teachers of Chinese as a foreign language from different schools believe that it is essential for Chinese language students at the elementary level to be able to differentiate synonyms. It shows that neither the textbooks nor teachers have paid enough attention to the synonym differentiation in teaching at the elementary level.This study first sums up10methods of teaching synonyms based on1) the review of40papers on teaching synonyms and2) the interviews with20teachers of Chinese as a foreign language. Then, according to the reulst of the the multiple-choice questionnairere conducted in five elementary Chinese language classes based on their learning content, the most suitable synonyms teaching methods have been found and are suggested as a result of the study. Suggestions on improving textbooks and teaching methods in terms of teaching synonyms have also been put forward.