A Comparative Study Between The HSK Standard Course 1 And A Course In Chinese(Revised Version,First Volume)

The paper compares the HSK Standard Course 1 with A Course in Chinese (revised version, first volume) from perspectives of the pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, Chinese characters, text, culture and exercise, which aims at revealing the development of Chinese intensive textbooks and optimizing the activities of teaching Chinese as a second language. In the meantime, the paper gets acquainted with foreign students’ views and demands for a Chinese intensive textbook and puts forward suggestions by analyzing questionnaires written by those students in Wuhan University, Central China Normal University and Jianghan University. Except for the preface and conclusion, the paper consists of following three parts:First of all, the paper makes a comparison in macroscopic design between the two Chinese intensive textbooks. In fact, both of them follow a writing principle of combining the structure, function and culture. The HSK Standard Course makes an emphasis on the language functionality, while A Course in Chinese attaches importance to grammar structuralization. In terms of two textbooks’ intention, they are both devoted to cultivating the Chinese communication competences for beginners. However, they are differs in compiling style.Secondly, it compares the language elements between the two Chinese intensive textbooks. On the one hand, there are some similarities between the two books, which can be concluded as follows:Their Chinese phonetic knowledge have been compiled from chapter 1 to chapter 15. Their quantity and rank of new words conform to the requirements of An Outline ranking Chinese Vocabularies and the Syllabus of the graded Vocabulary for HSK1. On the other hand, they vary in grammar and Chinese characters arrangement. The HSK Standard Course stresses "weaken syntax", while A Course in Chinese underlines "an overall analysis on syntax". The former organizes "Chinese characters" with guidance of "new words in texts", the latter compiles "Chinese characters" identifying with the " new words in texts".Thirdly, it compares the texts and exercises between the two Chinese intensive textbooks. The paper counts the number of topics, genres and difficulties in texts, kinds and quantities of exercises. As far as texts are concerned, their main topics are "daily life" and their difficulties advance gradually, but their topic interesting and continuity need to be improved immediately. In terms of exercise, communicative exercises are in The HSK Standard Course, whose content are interesting, highly efficient and close to the HSK Oral Test items. Given this, the author suggests that future Chinese intensive textbooks can adhere to this design concept. Memory simulated exercises are in A Course in Chinese. By means of creating context tactfully, it assures that knowledge points are repeated and exercise expressions are multiple. So the author highlights the context building in future texts compilation.As a primary Chinese intensive textbook, they are distinct from each other. The HSK Standard Course 1 highly matches with the key points, difficulties, knowledge points, topics, functions and settings in the exam of HSK. And the concept of combining teaching with examination is worth promoting. While A Course in Chinese, a earlier published textbook, has many layouts worthy of learning. If the future textbooks editing foster strengths and circumvent weaknesses, Chinese intensive textbooks will be more popular with users.