An Investigation On Culture Courses In Teaching Chinese As A Second Language

Language is not only the carrier of culture, but also an important part of culture. The learning of a language requires learning of the culture. Years of practice in foreign language teaching has proved that a successful language education is always accompanied by a successful culture education. The effects of language education will be undermined by an inappropriate culture teaching.However, among the current researches about culture education, the research of the education of culture elements in language class is piling up, with a relative neglect of the research on specific culture courses. How should culture courses be carried out,what should be its teaching objective, teaching content, teaching method, etc, still require further investigation and research.This research is an exploratory research aims to discover the current situation of culture courses in teaching Chinese as a second language. The following two research questions are to be answered: 1) What is the current situation of culture teaching in teaching Chinese as a second language? 2) What are the general problems in the culture teaching?This paper adapted both interview and questionnaire as the research instruments. In the interview, six teachers of culture courses were chosen as the subjects. The author aims to discover how the culture courses are carried out, what the problems are and how to improve them.In the questionnaire research, 64 overseas students majoring at Chinese at Wuhan University were chosen as the subjects. The author aims to find out students'preference of culture teaching and their expectation of ideal culture courses.By analysis and comparison of the results from the two research, the thesis presented the teachers'practice with regards to teaching objective, teaching approach, teaching content, etc, and the students'opinions with regards to these aspects. In order to improve the culture teaching to better satisfy both the course goals and students expectation, the author also attempted to provide a series of suggestion.The findings of this research are an important complement to the research of culture courses. .By doing investigation on current situations, the thesis included both the detailed and authentic practice materials of culture teaching and the reorganizations and the expectations of the students. It has also provided valuable reference for educators of culture courses in the field of teaching Chinese as a second language.