Analysis On Teaching Chinese In The Confucias Institute At The University Of Hawai'i At Manoa With The Application Of STARTALK Principles

With the development of overseas Chinese-teaching,how to better adapt Chinese teaching to the specific situation and requirements of the local people has become a key problem that more and more overseas Chinese teachers and volunteers need to solve.In order to perform more effective teaching,STARTALK program in the U.S.integrates various types of teaching principles,methods and models,which is of great significance for teachers to carry out.The author conducted teaching practice at The Confucius Institute at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa from 2018 to 2019.Taking advantage of participating in the 12th STARTALK Chinese summer camp program,the author deeply analyzed the teaching principles used there.The author selected typical cases based on her own class teaching experiences to analyze the advantages and disadvantages of the application of principles in actual teaching practice.In addition,the author also makes further exploration and reflection on the teaching practice so as to train future language volunteers and teachers for Chinese teaching,especially novice Chinese teachers.The first chapter summarizes the related research results of the STARTALK program and the various Chinese teaching situations in the U.S.It also tells about how other researchers have confirmed that the STARTALK is an effective way to teach.However,it also discusses some of the deficiencies of the STARTALK program as it is used in the Confucius Institutes around the U.S.The second chapter introduces the six effective curriculum principles of the STARTALK summer Chinese program.The six principles includ(1)Implementing a Standards-Based&Thematically Organized Curriculum;(2)Facilitating a Learner-Centered Classroom;(3)Using the Target Language and Providing Comprehensible Input;(4)Integrating Culture,Content,and Language;(5)Adapting and Using Age-Appropriate Authentic Materials and(6)Conducting Performance-Based Assessments.At the 12th STARTALK summer Chinese program there were many examples the principles being used effectively.At the same time,the second chapter summarizes and introduces the"Backward design" method and the "ACTFL foreign language proficiency guide" to judge language ability and set teaching objectives.The third chapter mainly introduces the application of STARTALK principles in teaching Chinese at the Confucius Institute at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa.According to the overall situation,the author designed a curriculum outline with eight different themes.Out of the eight themes,this paper selects the "Transportation" and"Weather" themes as two teaching design cases and analyzes the application of the six STARTALK principles in classroom teaching.The fourth chapter analyzes the learners' feedback on the reasons for their Chinese learning,their attitudes towards learning Chinese culture,their attitude towards the teacher's eight-part thematic syllabus.In addition,the learners gave feedback regarding the Chinese curriculum at the Confucius Institute and gave their suggestions on the application of STARTALK principles.The learners gave feedback via questionnaires and e-mail interviews.This paper reflects on the advantages and disadvantages of the application of the six STARTALK principles.At the same time,it provides some suggestions for the future.The fifth chapter is the conclusion which summarizes the research results,and points out the limitations of the research and prospects for the future.