A Study On The Cultur Lead-in In TCFL Chinee Idiom Teaching

In Chinese language teaching, Chinese idioms and culture lead-in are very closely linked. Most Chinese idioms serve as vessels of Chinese culture that are waiting to be understood. The stories behind each of these idioms show the richness of Chinese culture. In Chinese language teaching, a teacher can use these stories to facilitate the content of the lessons. However, many teachers neglect the importance of teaching Chinese idioms. For many foreign students, the mastery of Chinese idioms is a huge challenge. Many of them can only recognize and define the idioms but are not able to use them in their daily conversations.This research draws its foundation from the existing studies combined with a survey designed to explore the existing problems in learning and teaching Chinese idioms. The goals of this study are as follows:1) to learn about the foreign students’mastery of Chinese idioms;2) to explore the attitudes of the foreign students, who participated in the surveys, towards learning Chinese idioms;3) to find out the positive and negative effects of Chinese idioms in the respondents’; and lastly4) to propose a model for a successful Chinese culture factor lead-in.Through this study, the researcher discovered that the foreign students who have studied Chinese idioms have two disadvantages, i.e.1) teaching Chinese idioms is not a priority in Chinese teaching;2) the students are not motivated to study Chinese idioms;3) the students know very little about the stories behind Chinese idioms. However, the researcher also found2important advantages, i.e.1) their idiom recognition is very strong;2) the stories behind the idioms make the learning process more interesting. According to the current status of Chinese language teaching, using Chinese idioms as a tool for culture lead-in would not only explore the potential of Chinese idiom stories, but will also arouse the interest of the students however; the currently used teaching materials do not contain enough Chinese idioms. The researcher suggests that the future writers of Chinese teaching materials should compile the textbook according to the country’s Standard Curriculum or use the HSK Testing as reference.