The American Schoolchildren Chinese Cuokou Call Vowels Bias Analysis

The subject of this paper is the American students in middle and primary schools taking part in the summer project of "Chinese Bridge". Through class observation and tests, this thesis is to make research on the perceiving, pronunciation and reading of five pursed-mouth vowels: u,ue,uan,un,iong in the conditions of pronouncing alone, zero-consonant syllables and syllables of initial consonants. It records in detail the errors for students pronouncing pursed-mouth vowels, conducts some features when American students study them, analyzes the reasons for making errors and brings some suggestions. It is hoped that this paper could give some help on how to better acquire pursed-mouth vowels for American students.The investigation shows that when American students perceive the pursed-mouth vowels, the accuracy rate of the pure vowel, u, is the highest, while the compound and pursed-mouth vowel, uan, is the lowest. Students from Chinese background are more confused with the pursed-mouth vowels than those from pure English-speaking homes. For reading, the data shows that students can almost read pursed-mouth vowels in zero-consonant syllables correctly. They encounter more difficulties when the pursed-mouth vowels are combined with the consonants. The error rate is highest when the pursed-mouth vowel, ue, is combined with1. For pronunciation, the learning difficulty of pursed-mouth vowels could be ranged from strong to week:un>ue>u an>u>iong. The difficulties for acquiring the pursed-mouth vowels in various situations are:it is most difficult for students to acquire pursed-mouth vowels in syllables of initial consonants; then it is a little bit easy to learn pursed-mouth vowels in zero initial syllables; When pronounced alone, pursed-mouth vowels are the most impossible to make errors. Influencing by Pinyin, the rate of making error by students who pronounce the vowels without pinyin is far less than those with pinyin. The acquisitions of pursed-mouth vowels for students of different types vary:Pupils from Chinese background are more confused with pursed-mouth vowels than those from pure English-speaking families; the longer students study Chinese, the better they master pursed-mouth vowels.The reasons for the errors are mainly as follow:(1) negative transfer of their mother tongue;(2) influence of Chinese dialects;(3) influence of the spelling rules of Chinese phonetic alphabet;(4) memory errors;(5) the use frequency.The teaching of pursed-mouth vowels should be based on knowledge infusion and phonetic training. Knowledge infusion contains the teaching of the key methods to pronounce "if"and the spelling rules of Chinese phonetic alphabet. Phonetic training should be broken into two parts:perceiving training and pronunciation training. The later includes demonstration and imitation, hyperbole, comparing, making voiced sounds and explaining. Moreover, to suit the needs of students in primary and middle schools, especially those of young age, it could be to design some funny games, though which the pupils would be greatly attracted and the teaching effect largely improved.The analysis and research on American students in primary and middle schools will help Chinese teacher discover the methods more appropriate and amendments more effective; besides, it will promote the American students to better acquire pursed-mouth vowels.