The Study On Pinyin Cognition Of Beginning-Level Chinese Students

To improve the efficiency of teaching the "zero-starting-point" or "non-heritage" students learn Mandarin Chinese Pinyin, this article is designed to explore the potential laws in Pinyin teaching. The learning theory employed in this study was based on "what the learners have in their current memory is the premise of their future study," stated by the world renown psychologist and educator Robert Mills Gagne. This research focuses on this "premise" or "initial impression" of the learners' "inter-language" system, which has been inadequately statistically studied per article overview.The "dissipative structure" theory by the winner of The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1977, Ilya Prigogine, is often cited to describe the open characteristics of "inter-language" system. However, this research of Chinese phonology emphasizes on how students recognize and record sound-the process of "intake and document" at the beginning point of this "premise" or "system". This is not about the process of the "output" or sound making process of the inter-language as usual. The "recognition" of this process is also influenced by the "psycho-acoustic image" of the cognitive phonology. Some attention will also be put on the two tests after the initial one for a follow-up studies.The initial set of data in this study was collected from 100 non-heritage high school students in USA before their Pinyin study, if ever. Subsequently,15 students out of the 100 were monitored; data were collected at the end of one month and two months respectively. The three experiments used same 118 pinyin syllables pronounced all in Tone One to keep consistency. The results are analyzed under Cognitive Phonology with CA and EA. (Maybe it's better to use "mistake" here in stead of "error".) From the three experiments, the following conclusions are suggested: 1. According to their difficulties, the initials can be divided into three groups (seven each):"light teaching", "more teaching"; and "heavy teaching" three groups.2. The comprehension of finals is strongly influenced by the combinations with the initials. Hence, they are more difficult for the beginners to grasp.3. "0-initials" vary dramatically according to the syllables'similarity to the students' native language-English. The similarity improves the probability of accuracy.4. Students tend to pronounce the unaspirated initials "b, g, zh, and z" as the correspondent voiceless English consonants "p, k, ch, and s", but not vice versa.5. The improvement (p<0.02) of mastering Chinese Pinyin is associated with the length of teaching and study process, although the progress is not a straight linear.The author believes that those findings can be used as good reference or guidance for future Chinese Pinyin teaching. No doubt, more feedback and further study are needed to perfect the teaching rules and to develop the research topics.