Effect of Different Teaching Methods on Production of Mandarin Dipping Tone by English Speaking Learners

Abstract

This study was designed to test the effectiveness of two teaching methods on production of Mandarin Tone 3 by English-speaking learners. The control group of students (n=12) received the traditional instruction in which the direction of Tone 3 was emphasized while the experimental group of students (n=12) received the innovative instruction in which the height of Tone 3 was emphasized. The performance of these two groups of participants on producing Tone 3 on learnt and new words in the tonal environments of monosyllabic words, disyllabic words and sentences were tested three times (one month learning, two months learning, and three month learning). The results show the advantages of employing tonal height focused teaching method to teach Tone 3. First, tonal height focused teaching method works better on training students to produce tones in connected tonal environments which skill is more important for L2 learners to acquire for making phrases and sentences. Second, tonal height focused teaching method not only facilitate L2 learners to produce Tone 3 in trained lexical context, but also in untrained lexical context. It helps L2 learners to develop a self-learning skill on pronouncing unfamiliar words.