Experimental Research: Thailand’s Overseas Students’ Acquisition Of Chinese Two-syllabic And Tri-syllabic Words, Using Tone Sandhi Model

International relations between China and Thailand have grown increasingly close as the upsurge of Thai students studying abroad flood Chinese schools and universities. Thai students studying in China increase daily, resulting in Thailand becoming one of the most successful countries in the world to promote the education of Chinese as a foreign language. Therefore, it is essential to identify key areas that address particular problems in Chinese language acquisition for the Thai population.In the process of teaching Chinese to the Thai students, the author found that the tone of the students was a serious problem in pronunciation learning. Due to the lack of success and effect of Chinese traditional teaching methods applied to Thai’s students’ language learning, the author proposes a closer examination in key problematic areas relating to Thailand students. The author suggests that students’ tone pronunciation is not authentic, but constructed from their own native Thai language, creating a dissonance and inauthenticity of tone pronunciation. This problem also relates to the lack of self-identification and self-correction, hindering Thai students’ Chinese language learning and acquisition.The author synthetically compared Chinese Mandarin B students and Thailand students’ experimental data of two or three syallabic tone sandhi. Two-syllabic sandhi is a basic structure, while a tri-syllabic sandhi is applied to connect words and sentence. Through conducting acoustic and perceptual experiments focused on two- and three-syllabic tones between the control group and the Thai students identified main types of modulation errors of Thailand students. Modulation errors in the two-syllabic group included eleven patterns: yin ping and yin ping, yin ping and rising tone, yin ping and third tone,yin ping and falling tone, rising tone and yin ping, rising tone and rising tone, rising tone and third tone, rising tone and falling tone,third tone and non-third tone, third tone and third tone, falling tone and third tone,and falling tone and falling tone. Modulation errors in tri-syllabic group included three third tone modulation errors where there were double single and single double patterns; in other words, when the rising tone was on the middle word, the first word’ tail was high, while the last word’ head was low, although both were high; when third tone was on the middle word, the first word was a non-third tone and the last word was a third tone, yet both were non-third tone words.According to the “identify and phonetic” experiment, where the perception error type and error rate were analyzed, Thai students’ main misperception types were in the two-syllabic and tri-syllabic group. They were making mistakes with the rising tone and third tone. Primary grades had the highest error rate, while the intermediate students took second place, and the advanced students produced the lowest error rate. Furthermore, the perception experiment demonstrated error rates of perception in Thai’s student’s pronunciation in comparison to Chinese standard pronunciation. It was concluded that the Thai students’ perception of standard Chinese pronunciation accuracy was higher than students’ pronunciation accuracy.In addition, research comparing Thai students’ Chinese tone pronunciations with Thai language patterns, suggests that a transfer of their mother tongue negatively affects the Thai students’ Chinese tone. Students in their early and middle stages of language acquisition relate the first tone of Thai to yin ping, the fifth tone of Thai to the rising tone, the second tone of Thai to third tone, and the third tone of Thai to falling tone. By comparing error categories of the single, the two-syllabic and tri-syllabic group, it was concluded that the modulation errors of the rising tone in the two-syllabic and tri-syllabic group was due to the rising tone of the single word pronunciation, and the fold point on the middle, making a similar tone type. Moreover, variations in the yin ping were not high enough, while falling points’ ending point was too high, both due to the Thai tone domain being narrower than the Chinese tone. Therefore, Thailand students studying in China were incorrectly applying their Thai tone domains to learning Chinese. Furthermore, comparing the experimental research results of the perception and acoustic experiments suggests that one of the reasons for language errors made by Thai students studying in China, particularly in the two-syllabic and tri-syllabic group was the perception error in the rising tone and third tone.In response to these research results, additional teaching experiments were designed for the Thai students. In accordance to the conclusions found in the students’ acoustic experiment data, teaching experiments demonstrated that an acoustic contrast figure approach was more effective than an interpretation method in helping students to discover and realize their own mistakes, leading to increasing levels of successful self-identification and self-correction. Teaching practices that phased Thai students into systematic practice of Chinese words including two characters, then three characters and four characters utilizing distinct tone combinations proved effective. Identifying for Thai students the correct tone of a single character, led Thai students’ towards demonstrating self-correction of errors caused by pronunciation mistakes, thus demonstrating understanding of progressive transformation and tone pronunciation. Effective teaching strategies also included making manageable tone arrangements and allowing Thai students to identify them through listening exercises. Students could also set up Chinese tone modulations demonstrating their perception of the phonetic pronunciations, in hopes of improving their Chinese pronunciation of tones and language learning and acquisition.These research experiments focusing on Thai’s students’ second language acquisition provided important results that led to improving teaching methodologies as well as increasing the quality of the Thai’s students study abroad experience in China. Continued research on different pedagogies targeting specific populations will increase the quality of education in China. It is essential that teaching methods continue to address students’ needs.