Abstract
Three kinds of knowledge that effective teachers should master have been proposed: content knowledge (CK), pedagogical knowledge (PK), and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK). Most PCK studies have been conducted in the mathematics or science domain. In recent years, a growing number of studies related to foreign language teachers’ PCK have appeared. However, there is a paucity of studies that explore teachers’ PCK in the field of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL). In this study, we present a conceptualization of Chinese as foreign teachers’ PCK when they teach Chinese pronunciation. The research design builds on semi-structured interviews involving 20 CFL teachers (n = 20), focusing on five PCK domains: (1) teachers’ knowledge of Chinese pronunciation subject content (initials, finals, tones, intonation, and stress), (2) their curriculum knowledge, (3) their knowledge of students’ mistakes and difficulties, (4) their knowledge of Chinese pronunciation-specific instructional strategies, and (5) their knowledge of instructional media. The results show that CFL teachers reflect a strong mastery of PCK concerning teaching tones, followed by initials and finals. Teachers’ PCK regarding teaching intonation and stress were much weaker in all five PCK components. Their PCK of teaching intermediate-level and advanced-level students was also limited by curriculum and time arrangement restrictions.
Keywords
I Introduction
Research has shown that students of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) experience difficulties in the production of accurate Chinese pronunciation (Gong, Gao, & Lyu, 2020; Yang, 2019; Zhang, 2019). These difficulties are linked to the following areas: (1) distinguishing alveolars and retroflexes; (2) distinguishing aspirated and unaspirated initials; (3) mastering Tone 3 (t3) sandhi and Tone 4 (t4) sandhi; (4) adopting the pitch range and pitch patterns of Chinese intonation; and (5) changing the fundamental frequency (F0) differences between Chinese language statements and different types of questions. Previous research has shown that some of these difficulties arise from the nature of CFL teachers’ instructional approaches (Li et al., 2021). The present study builds on previous research findings and aims to identify, in more depth, the nature of CFL teachers’ difficulties. This conceptualizes our focus on teachers’ pedagogical and content knowledge (PCK). Research in the domain of mathematics and science has shown the importance of PCK in mapping instructional quality and how PCK is related to students’ achievements (Baumert et al., 2010; Depaepe et al., 2015; Hanuscin, Cisterna, & Lipsitz, 2018). PCK research in the field of CFL is lacking. Although some studies have attempted to reveal students’ Chinese language related errors (Yang, 2011), there is a gap in the literature regarding a comprehensive understanding of in-service CFL teachers’ PCK and the PCK in relation to teaching Chinese pronunciation in particular. In addition, influenced by the rapid development of information technology, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic, integrating up-to-date technologies into online teaching contexts has become an urgent need for teachers (Zhang, 2020). This also applies to CFL teachers. There have been several studies that explore how technologies are applied in the CFL field (Cai, 2016; Chai, Wong, & King, 2016; Cheng & Zhan, 2012; Tseng, Lien, & Chen, 2016); however, there has been little focus on how CFL teachers have also been using these technologies, for instance during the Covid-19 pandemic.
To narrow this research gap, we explore in-service teachers’ PCK regarding Chinese pronunciation in this study. In particular, we explore how in-service CFL teachers’ PCK is measured and characterized for teaching Chinese pronunciation. More specifically, this study investigates how CFL teachers’ PCK is conceptualized in teaching pronunciation and the extent to which specific shortcomings in CFL teachers’ PCK for teaching Chinese suprasegments can be identified. Following a short overview of the available PCK-related research in various knowledge domains, we illustrate our research design, followed by the main findings. In the last section, we summarize and discuss our key findings and their theoretical and practical implications.
1 The PCK framework
Shulman (1986a, 1986b, 1987) defines PCK as the foundation of a teacher’s knowledge base. According to Shulman (1986a, 1986b), PCK refers to the knowledge of how teachers can make the subject matter accessible to students. Two central components of PCK have been identified, including knowledge of students’ subject-specific conceptions and misconceptions, and knowledge of subject-specific instructional strategies (Loewenberg Ball, Thames, & Phelps, 2008; Park & Oliver, 2008). Based on Shulman’s work, Grossman (1990) stressed four components at the core of teachers’ PCK: (1) knowledge of students’ understanding, (2) knowledge of curriculum, (3) knowledge of instructional strategies, and (4) knowledge of goals for teaching. In addition, Marks (1990) enriched this conceptualization of the PCK structure with the following knowledge areas: (1) students’ understanding, (2) media for instruction, (3) the subject matter, and (4) instructional processes. Loewenberg et al. (2008) fleshed out the domains of mathematical knowledge for teaching, comprising (1) common content knowledge, (2) horizon content knowledge, (3) specialized content and knowledge, (4) knowledge of content and students, (5) knowledge of content and teaching, and (6) knowledge of content and curriculum.
Based on Shulman’s ideas of PCK, Mishra and Koehler (2006) proposed a technology pedagogy content knowledge (TPCK or TPACK) framework. TPCK emphasizes the integration of technology, pedagogy, and content (Koehler & Mishra, 2005). Teachers who wish to use technology in their teaching need to understand the representation of relevant concepts for using pedagogical techniques to teach content as well as have knowledge of how to solve students’ problems with the help of technology, students’ prior knowledge, and cognitive theories (Milner-Bolotin, 2015).
Last, Van Driel and Verloop (2002) introduced an additional perspective on the PCK framework while focusing on chemistry teaching. They argued that the context in which the teaching took place played an important role. This is especially true for primary and secondary school contexts that can vary tremendously and where student diversity interferes with teachers’ actions. Variations in school contexts, especially given the large and growing diversity in school populations, justify the addition of this extra perspective to teachers’ PCK.
2 Teachers’ PCK of teaching foreign languages
Research on PCK has mainly focused on the mathematics and sciences subject domains (Daehler, Heller & Wong, 2015; Ellebæk, 2021; Fraser, Beswick, & Crowley, 2019; Park, 2019). Some specific findings that have been obtained in these subject domains include selecting appropriate tasks for students, noticing students’ mistakes and comprehension difficulties, and providing appropriate subject-specific instructional strategies (Kind, 2016; Lee & Luft, 2008; Mayer, 2004; Williams, 2002). However, it is not clear whether these findings can be transferred to other subject domains. In the domain of foreign language teaching, the special nature of the learning objects and learning content (a foreign language) suggests affordances that might be unique (Freeman & Cameron, 2008).
Despite the unique features of foreign language teaching, when compared to, for example, the mathematics or sciences teaching domain, research on foreign language teachers’ PCK remains limited. Researchers in the language teaching field have sought to reformulate the PCK framework, considering the specialty of language teaching. Watzke (2007) proposed a theoretical PCK framework comprising four core categories of foreign language teaching: (1) prior knowledge that frames instructional decisions, (2) attitudes toward teacher control in the classroom, (3) instructional goals for daily lessons, and (4) considerations for responding to student affect. Troyan, Cammarata, and Martel (2017) presented an adapted PCK framework, I-PCK, based on Shulman’s (1987) PCK framework and content-based instruction theory, including knowledge of both language and content as a discipline, the relationship between language and content as disciplines, general pedagogical knowledge, pedagogical knowledge specific to the teaching of the target language, and subject matter. However, in Troyan et al.’s (2017) framework, they neglected students’ knowledge, which is essential for teachers’ PCK.
In a foreign language classroom, in the first year, foreign language teachers typically use the target students’ native language or a lingua franca (such as English) to explain grammatical content and the target language to conduct oral or written production. Thus, in this phase, the native language is used as a tool in class and the target language is used as the topic. Later on, after students have gradually acquired a basic knowledge of the target language, foreign language teachers begin to use the target language to teach the subject matter. In this phase, the target language is used both as a subject matter and a teaching tool. Students are required to respond in the target language in both phases. However, this implies that teachers need to pay attention to two instructional levels simultaneously: the language forms used by students and the content of students’ utterances (Tarone & Allwright, 2005). The focus on forms and content also differs from situation to situation. Besides the unique feature of the content and medium in the foreign language teaching domain, strategies implemented by teachers are different from those applied in teaching other subjects (Johnston & Goettsch, 2000). Oral (speaking and listening) and written production (reading and writing) in foreign language teaching are vastly different dimensions that challenge teachers’ PCK, who are expected to look for fitting solutions to support all language levels.
In attempts to study foreign language teachers’ PCK knowledge, qualitative and quantitative approaches have been adopted, mainly in the field of teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL) (Borg, 2006; Gatbonton, 2008; König & Kramer, 2016). Borg (2006) investigated self-reports from 200 language teachers and found that language teachers were different regarding the nature of the subject, teaching content, teaching methodology, teacher–learner relationships, and contrasts between native and non-native speakers. A key point is that language teachers’ distinctive characteristics might differ depending on the context. Gatbonton (2008) analysed four novice English as a second language (ESL) teachers’ reports using both qualitative and quantitative methods, and compared the differences in the categories of PK (including language management, procedure check, progress review, beliefs, knowledge of students, decisions, and affective issues) between novice ESL and experienced ESL teachers. The results showed that novice ESL teachers could acquire the experienced teachers’ PK within a short time, but might take a little longer to effectively apply this knowledge. König et al. (2016) used a quantitative method to explore the structure of TEFL teachers’ PCK-knowledge and the relationship between PCK, CK (knowledge of the subject matter to be taught by teachers), and general PK (GPK) (the knowledge that is not subject-matter related). The results showed that ESL teacher knowledge was a multidimensional construct, and that PCK was closely related to both CK and GPK. Morton (2016) combined Loewenberg Ball et al.’s (2008) concept of CK for teaching with illustrative analyses to discover teachers’ knowledge of immersion programs or content and language integrated learning contexts. Han et al. (2021) adopted a qualitative case study approach to analyse three ESL teachers’ PCK and found that the ESL teachers’ conceptions were essential for PCK development. The development of different PCK components was mainly attributed to different types of learning activities. Teachers’ CK could influence the development of PCK.
In other foreign language teaching fields, Evens et al. (2016) investigated differences between teachers’ PCK, CK, and PK in teachers of French as a foreign language, and found that both teacher education and teaching experience impacted PCK development. Hlas and Hildebrandt (2010) investigated differences in PCK in writing skills between students with a major in Spanish education and those with a major in Spanish liberal arts (LA). The results indicated that the former performed better in language awareness, effective teaching, and knowledge of learners, showing that teacher education programs significantly influenced teachers’ PCK. Troyan et al. (2017) conducted a case study with a Spanish teacher, and emphasized the advantages of language teacher education focused on content-based instruction. Watzke (2007) offered a qualitative study with nine beginning foreign language teachers to explore their PCK and its development after two years of teaching. Studies have also been conducted to determine language teachers’ PCK after receiving certain education instructions. Van Compernolle and Henery (2015) analysed the development of a second language (L2) teacher’s knowledge on teaching French after receiving concept-based pragmatics instruction (CBPI); the results showed that CBPI improved the teacher’s classroom teaching.
In the context of teaching L2 pronunciation, only one study delved into teachers’ PCK. Baker and Murphy (2011) reviewed a few studies to document ESL teachers’ knowledge base (learner, curriculum, and teacher) for pronunciation teaching.
3 PCK in the field of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL)
Based on the aforementioned discussion, the reader may have acknowledged that there is a lack of emphasis on PCK in the CFL field. This was indeed our conclusion when we reviewed the relevant literature. The only available studies focus on CFL teachers’ TPCK when teaching Chinese, and are mainly about the relationship between teachers’ beliefs and their technological PCK. Chai et al. (2013) used both quantitative and qualitative methods, and found that CFL teachers rated themselves more competent in CK rather than in TPCK. CFL teachers’ TPCK was more related to their constructivist pedagogical beliefs than to traditional beliefs. Juan, Chang, and Liang (2019) used three questionnaires to assess 200 CFL teachers’ performance on teaching beliefs, perceptions of TPCK, and their teaching self-efficacy. A positive relationship was found between CFL teachers’ constructivism belief and their TPCK. Enhancing CFL teachers’ constructivism belief can also improve their perceptions of TPCK and their teaching self-efficacy. However, to our knowledge, no studies are available that focus on the PCK of CFL teachers for teaching Chinese pronunciation.
4 The PCK framework for the present study
Recent perspectives on PCK have added a further specification of teachers’ CK by differentiating between four types of CK. Loewenberg Ball et al. (2008) introduced this differentiation for the first time in the mathematics domain, while Morton (2016) transferred it into the language teaching domain: (1) common language knowledge, (2) specialized language knowledge, (3) knowledge of language and students, and (4) knowledge of language and teaching. Regarding the first two types, they are closely related to features of content-related language instruction since a distinction is made between the common language to be mastered and the subject-specific language of a knowledge domain. In the present study, there is no focus on content-based language instruction; therefore, these types are less relevant. However, the other two types offer a richer picture. First, knowledge of language and students introduces a special focus on how students deal with difficulties and mistakes. Second, knowledge of language and teaching stresses a very specific focus on how teachers deal with language issues while they develop an instructional approach and choose appropriate instructional strategies.
Based on the similarities and differences between the above frameworks, and considering language teaching, an integrated perspective was developed comprising five components to map our CFL-related PCK framework: (1) knowledge of the subject matter (KSM), (2) knowledge of the curriculum (KC), (3) knowledge of students’ mistakes and difficulties (KSMs), (4) knowledge of effective instructional strategies (KIS), and (5) knowledge of instructional media (KM). KSMs concerns important and relevant ideas for teaching a given topic and the prerequisite knowledge for a given topic. KC refers to the goals to be pursued for students while considering their different achievement levels (Blömeke, Suhl, & Kaiser, 2011), the appropriate instructional designs for solving students’ problems (Blömeke et al., 2011), the knowledge of different learning contexts (Zaslavsky & Leikin, 2004), and the competence to connect a particular learning setting with a particular Chinese pronunciation topic or task (Zaslavsky & Leikin, 2004). KSMs refers to teachers’ knowledge about the implicit or explicit wrong ideas and beliefs that students can embrace about knowledge elements, relationships, mechanisms, and procedures, and the difficulties that students may have in their learning in order for teachers to draw upon this knowledge to create appropriate teaching settings (Park, & Oliver, 2008). KIS consists of two categories: subject-specific and topic-specific strategies (Magnusson, Krajcik & Borko, 1999). Subject-specific strategies relate to generic strategies that are consistent with the goals of a school subject, while topic-specific strategies refer to those that are especially relevant for the teaching of particular topics within a subject domain. KM refers to the instructional use of tools and technologies and their appropriate pairing with the goals and the nature of the students (Loewenberg Ball et al., 2008).
II Methodology
1 Participants
The present analyses are based on data collected from 20 CFL teachers in different countries. Of the 20 CFL teachers, twelve taught Chinese at Belgium’s higher education institutions, while the remaining eight teachers taught at higher education institutions in other countries (see Table 1). All study participants signed an informed consent form, which guaranteed the anonymity of their personal data and the use of the data collected solely for the purposes of this research. In the Belgian context, we included all the CFL teachers who taught Chinese pronunciation in the higher education institutions and had received CFL certificates. Given that there were few CFL teachers, we expanded the selection of CFL teachers to both the French and Dutch speaking areas, i.e. Wallonia and Flanders. Additional CFL teachers were included to increase the numbers and sample variation. Approximately two-thirds of the 20 teachers were female and one third male. The average number of years of participants’ teaching experience was 7.7 years.
Background characteristics of the participants (n = 20).
Notes. IC = integrated Chinese course; OC = oral Chinese course; RC = reading Chinese course; WC = writing Chinese course; BC = business Chinese course; LC = listening Chinese course; PC = pronunciation practicing course.
Given the nature of this sample, we can discuss whether uncontrolled variation may not be the cause of sampling bias and may introduce a neglect of what PCK researchers emphasize as the situated nature of PCK. We control for the teaching setting (university level) and focus on a shared language frame of reference, i.e. the Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi (HSK). CFL researchers and teachers use the HSK as a strict point of reference (Lu, 2017) not only to assess students’ proficiency and evaluate their learning outcomes in four language skills, but also to help teachers to establish common instructional goals and standards, regardless of the different contexts. Nevertheless, other teacher characteristics may play a role, such as country, gender, age, or teaching experiences. We acknowledge this and will return to this topic in Section IV.
2 Data collection of CFL teachers’ PCK
PCK interviews were based on PCK test items. Consistent with the PCK theoretical framework, the PCK interviews contained five subscales: teachers’ KSM in teaching Chinese pronunciation, KC, KSMs, knowledge of Chinese pronunciation-specific instructional strategies, and KM while teaching CFL. To assess their KSM, the CFL teachers were asked to share their understanding of relevant Chinese pronunciation content (e.g. initials, finals, tones, intonation, and stress) (Table 2, Question 1). Two open-ended questions were constructed in such a manner that we could establish how the CFL teachers arranged their teaching of Chinese pronunciation at different mastery levels, the time they spent teaching this subtopic (Table 2, Question 2) and the strategies (at least 3) they typically used in teaching Chinese pronunciation, in order to determine the teachers’ understanding of the important topics relevant to the curriculum as a whole (Table 2, Question 3). Knowledge of students’ pronunciation mistakes was investigated by presenting the teachers with six reading audio-recordings from CFL students at three different language mastery levels (beginning, intermediate, and advanced). The participating teachers were asked to list as many students’ pronunciation problems concerning each Chinese pronunciation aspect as possible (Table 2, Question 4). Knowledge of Chinese pronunciation-specific instructional strategies and the instructional media that were adopted while teaching this specific topic were tested using one question that required the teachers to present strategies in terms of each Chinese pronunciation aspect (Table 2, Question 5). Table 1 presents the PCK test items as they are linked to the theoretical framework.
Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) dimensions and interview questions.
a Coding and index approach
All the answers to the open-ended questions were recorded and subsequently evaluated by two independent researchers. In the event of a disagreement, consensus was reached through discussion. The evaluation of the interview responses was guided by the literature. For each question, the researchers relied on the literature to find possible answers; e.g. KSM mastered by the CFL teachers, the list of the common mistakes made by students, specific strategies to address a pronunciation problem, the curriculum to guide the CFL teachers’ pronunciation teaching, and the media used by the CFL teachers. The coding schemes were based on earlier analyses of the literature (Huang & Liao, 2017; Li et al., 2021; Liu, 2019; Huang & Navarre, 2019; Ran & Yu, 2019; Yang, 2011; Ye, 2003; Zhao & Duan, 2019). Together with an analytical picture of the teachers’ answers, this coding approach resulted in an index score. In the event of no response or when a non-valid response was provided, a score of 0 was assigned. When a valid response element was provided, a score of +1 was assigned. Additionally, a partial score was possible. This implies that when participants replied with several valid responses, the sum of all these valid responses was calculated. Paraphrasing the same element or repeating the same response to a question was coded and scored only once.
b Procedure
The PCK interview was conducted individually, either in a separate room at the participants’ institutions or via an online meeting when it was not possible to conduct the interview face-to-face. The average time required to finish the interview was approximately three hours. As stated above, the interviews were recorded for data analysis. The interview mode (face to face versus online) did not result in timing differences.
c Content validity
To maximize the content validity of the interview items, the question items were formulated as closely as possible to the key dimensions of the PCK model. In addition, each PCK question item was checked by three independent CFL teachers and three university CFL educators – who were not involved in the study – to confirm whether the item content was closely related to CFL pronunciation teaching in higher education and reflected the nature and orientation from the PCK model.
d Coding reliability
As mentioned above, the two raters’ coding and index scores were compared to calculate interrater reliability. With a Cohen’s κ of 0.844, we can conclude that a high level of agreement was achieved (Altman, 1990). Cohen’s κ was 0.752 for KSM, 0.812 for KC, 0.793 for KSMs, 0.891 for Chinese pronunciation-specific KIS, and 0.971 for KM. Interrater agreement was next attained through discussion when there was initial disagreement. Only after attaining consensus were a final coding and index score determined.
III Results
1 Knowledge of subject matter (KSM)
Building on the analysis of the answers to the KSMs interview items, the CFL teachers’ index scores reflect large differences (see Table 3). For some teachers, the index score is low for each of the 5 pronunciation elements (initials, finals, tones, intonation, and stress). However, we also observe how individual teachers reflect differences depending on the nature of the pronunciation element.
Index scores for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ knowledge of the subject matter (KSM) and mean score and standard deviation (SD).
Notes. * The number between the brackets refers to the maximum number of elements that can be proposed in relation to each pronunciation aspect according to the book, Modern Chinese (Huang & Liao, 2017). In all classic handbooks on modern Chinese for CFL students, there are usually clear explanations of Chinese initials, finals, and tones, but no thorough treatment of intonation and stress.
When further examining the CFL teachers’ KSM in teaching Chinese pronunciation; the descriptive analyses (Table 3) show that they have limited knowledge about intonation (M = 1.75; SD = 3.16) and stress (M = 1.5; SD = 2.35), when compared to initials (M = 2.05; SD = 2.28), finals (M = 1.85; SD = 3.06) and tones (M = 2.25; SD = 3.27).
Based on the index scores we obtained from the CFL teachers’ answers, we attempted to explore in detail how the CFL teachers understood the five pronunciation aspects. Considering the data in Table 3, a higher average index score was observed concerning the knowledge of tones. This index score was consistently higher than those for the other four aspects, which indicated that the teachers might master a broad knowledge of Chinese tones. A more detailed analysis of the teachers’ KSM in relation to the tones showed that all the teachers could describe the four Chinese tones and the neutral tone; this implied that all the teachers attained at least an index score of 1. Regarding the other tone-aspects, a more varied picture emerged: exact pitch levels of each tone were mentioned by 13 teachers, t3 tone sandhi by six teachers, suffixation of a non-syllabic ‘r’ by three teachers, and ‘一/不’ (yī/bù) tone sandhi by two out of 20 teachers.
Considering the teachers’ KSMs concerning Chinese initials in detail, we found an overall lower index score (M = 2.05 and SD = 2.28), given the maximum of 6. All the teachers mentioned that ‘initials feature in the front part of the Chinese syllable’ correctly; 13 of the teachers mentioned ‘there are 23 different initials’, while seven of the 20 teachers explicitly stated ‘the different categories of Chinese initials’; only two of the 20 mentioned specific difficult initials for students to acquire, and that students’ difficulties varied based on their L1.
The index score for CFL teachers’ knowledge about finals varied considerably between the 20 teachers (SD > 3). Three of the 20 CFL teachers could not provide any explanation. In total, 17 CFL teachers mentioned the correct location of finals in a Chinese syllable, 13 teachers could enumerate the categories of finals, four teachers explained the names of the different taxonomies, two teachers stated that ‘a Chinese syllable can only have finals’, and two teachers mentioned the exact numbers of single finals and compound finals.
The CFL teachers’ knowledge of intonation was limited. The definition of Chinese intonation refers to the representation by F0 and the duration, including rising and declining intonations (Jianfen, 2000). Up to 15 teachers considered the Chinese intonation as ‘the features of rising and falling in speaking’, nine teachers stated that ‘not all questions have a rising intonation’, three teachers connected Chinese intonation with the different utterances, genres, and emotions, and only one teacher of the 20 reported ‘the form of Chinese intonation presents as a declined trend of pitch register.’
The worst average KSM score was observed in relation to stress. Stress in Chinese covers three levels: words, phrases, and sentences, while each level applies different stress rules (Yang, 1991). Function words, information structure, and syntactic contexts in a sentence also affect the pattern of stress (Che & Tao, 2013). The CFL teachers’ knowledge of stress in pronunciation mainly focused on stress for emphasizing the key information in a sentence (ten teachers) and the use of stress to avoid ambiguity (nine teachers). Four teachers mentioned that word-level stress usually fell on the syllables that brought forward the meaning of a word, such as the stress on ‘头 (tóu)’ in the phrase, ‘洗头 (xǐ tóu),’ as compared to ‘脚 (jiǎo)’ in the phrase, ‘洗脚 (xǐ jiǎo).’
Considering the five key pronunciation aspects (Li et al., 2021), the scores in Table 3 illustrate that the CFL teachers mainly struggled with intonation and stress. In relation to these pronunciation aspects, rather vague or no explanations were given. Concerning stress, nearly half of the teachers could not provide more explanations except for the general consensus that its function was to emphasize the key information. The latter also applied to the CFL teachers’ knowledge of intonation, where almost half of the teachers even had difficulties identifying theoretical concepts such as the characteristics of intonation. These results can be linked to what is being taught in class and when we consider the KC. The CFL teachers’ knowledge is closely related to the teaching content in class that focuses strongly on initials, finals, and tones rather than intonation and stress (see Table 5 below).
2 Knowledge of the Curriculum (KC)
The CFL teachers’ indices were found to be lowest for S3 and S4 (M = .75; SD = .63), which suggests that their competence to connect the learning contexts with a particular Chinese topic or task is restricted. Two teachers pointed out, for example, that they would use dialogues to explain the contexts for the use of modal particles, and after the students understood the different contexts, the teacher would then demonstrate how to adequately pronounce these modal particles. Eight teachers created a communicative environment and used dialogues to assist students to master intonation or stress. Two teachers mentioned that they created a musical learning environment and used a song to teach Chinese initials. Two teachers prepared some cards with Chinese finals, and then students were instructed to choose the correct card based on the finals they heard. We also noticed that the correlation between S3 and S4 was very close, which meant that the CFL teachers who had knowledge of different Chinese pronunciation learning contexts could also choose appropriate settings and designs for the relevant Chinese pronunciation tasks. Intonation and stress were the two main focal points for which the CFL teachers would like to build learning contexts, which may be related to the characteristics of intonation and stress, which are closely related to contexts.
S2 refers to how teachers approach the overall instructional design of a lesson. This can invoke the design of goals, strategies, content, learning contexts, etc. We found consensus concerning the sequence in which the CFL teachers taught Chinese pronunciation aspects to students (referring to S2). Initials, finals, and tones were taught during the initial teaching and learning phase for CFL beginners, while intonation and stress were not touched on in the first semester. Nine of the twenty teachers could explain in detail how they organized each Chinese pronunciation aspect, such as the materials they used for practicing different aspects, the difficult initials / finals / tones for students to learn, the duration they spent on different aspects, and the combinations of teaching specific aspects in particular types of Chinese classes. We noticed that CFL teachers mainly referred to segments when they discussed Chinese pronunciation. Therefore, their understanding and curriculum arrangements were more in-depth. We were also aware of the fact that, although a few teachers claimed that they practiced intonation and stress with intermediate- or advanced-level students, the time they spent and the illuminations of their teaching remained rather limited. They simply corrected students’ mistakes concerning stress and intonation in class. No explanations and examples were provided to help students acquire a comprehensive understanding of intonation and stress.
The highest index score for S2 (M = 6.3; SD = 1.74) suggested that CFL teachers could successfully determine how to construct a lesson to best support students’ pronunciation learning. All the teachers were familiar with their institutions’ curriculum standards for different-level students and attempted to adjust the pronunciation teaching content based on the importance thereof. Of the 20 teachers, 18 explained their students’ difficulties in each aspect, and designed particular strategies based on the students’ native-languages and their weaknesses in mastering the Chinese language. Only two teachers presented curriculum designs for the teaching of tones. As their initial teaching phase, the CFL teachers seemed to prefer to plan, present, and adjust their overall teaching designs in teaching Chinese initials, finals, and tones. However, while students improved their mastery levels, the CFL teachers gradually regarded pronunciation teaching as an auxiliary of their teaching, and the focus of the curriculum content changed to vocabulary and syntax.
The low index score for S1 (M = 1.6; SD = .75) showed that the CFL teachers had limited knowledge of setting appropriate goals. Table 4 illustrates that only three teachers clearly explained the goals for teaching students at different pronunciation mastery levels and/or referred to standards that students should reach for each level. Six teachers could define clear goals and standards for beginning-level and advanced-level students, while eleven teachers only managed to explain what goals and standards the beginning-level students should attain. This implies that more than half of the participating CFL teachers had difficulties in identifying appropriate goals and setting standards for advanced- and intermediate-level students. This may cause confusion and decrease CFL students’ motivation to work on their pronunciation after the beginning-level. Students may overestimate their oral proficiency if continued attention is not paid to their pronunciation (Liu, 2019).
Index scores for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ knowledge of the curriculum (KC).
Based on the three subcomponents of KC, we charted the first subcomponent, ‘establishing appropriate instructional goals’, as S1 (M = 1.6; SD = .75), ‘selecting appropriate instructional designs’ as S2 (M = 6.3; SD = 1.74), ‘knowledge of different learning contexts’ as S3 (M = .75; SD = .63), and ‘connecting learning contexts with a suitable topic or task’ as S4 (M = .75; SD = .63).
3 Knowledge of Students’ Mistakes (KSMs)
Because we built on the PCK framework, recent extensions have stressed the need to explicitly differentiate between language-related CK and how students deal with it; thus, in our analysis, we also stressed the type of CK that considered how students made mistakes and experienced difficulties with the language. In this part of the interview, the teachers were presented with six student cases to elicit their KSMs. The calculation of the index score for each pronunciation facet was done based on the research on pronunciation errors mentioned in Ran & Yu (2019) and Yang (2011). Each consecutive case was from a student with a different pronunciation mastery level: beginning level (Students 1 and 2), intermediate level (Students 3 and 4), and advanced level (Students 5 and 6). Details of the six CFL students’ mistakes detected by expert CFL teachers are presented in Appendix 1 in supplemental material. The mean and SD scores (see Table 5) obtained from the five Chinese pronunciation aspects of the CFL teachers’ KSMs were ranked from the highest to the lowest: tone (M = 3.28; SD = 4.64), initial (M = 1.41; SD = 1.41), final (M = .88; SD = .91), intonation (M = .68; SD = .72), and stress (M = 0.43; SD = 0.59). Table 6 summarizes the various CFL students’ pronunciation mistakes. Moreover, the ranking of the mean and SD scores for the various students’ mistakes were aligned with the index scores in Table 5. These two tables help to define the expected maximum number for each pronunciation aspect in the teachers’ input and the extent to which the CFL teachers could identify the mistakes. The data in Table 5 suggest that, in particular, the CFL teachers could better identify students’ mistakes regarding tones, initials, and finals that interfered with their pronunciation.
Mean scores (M) and standard deviations (SD) of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ knowledge of the subject matter (KSM) index scores for five Chinese pronunciation aspects.
Various categories of knowledge of the subject matter (KSM) identified by Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers regarding five Chinese pronunciation aspects in six student cases.
Students’ mistakes concerning tone were extensive, as reflected in the high average index score (M = 3.28; SD = 4.64), while the variety of the mistakes with tones (M = 9.33; SD = 1.37) support this finding. This result suggests that teachers are more sensitive to students’ tone mistakes and feel more confident correcting related student mistakes. Most mistakes concerning tones were identified by all 20 CFL teachers. We can therefore state that their KSMs regarding tone is rather advanced at general and specific levels. Mistakes regarding all four tones and tone sandhi were included by the CFL teachers.
The index score for CFL teachers’ KSMs (M = 1.41; SD = 1.41) regarding initials can be ranked second at a general level. Regarding the variety of mistakes, we observed a relatively high index score (M = 7.33; SD = 2.66). The high SD indicates that the six students’ various mistakes were significantly different. The various mistakes uncovered by the CFL teachers gradually decreased as the six students’ pronunciation mastery level rose (see Table 6). We noticed that the mistakes pointed out by the CFL teachers focused on ‘/ɕ/, /tɕ/, /tɕʰ/, /ts/, /tsʰ/, /t/, /tʰ/, /ʂ/, /s/, /p/, and /pʰ/’ initials, which were relatively difficult for the CFL students to pronounce correctly. Compared to the maximum index score for the six students’ mistakes on initials, the CFL teachers could identify most of the mistakes made by the students, which was a good sign.
Further analysis of the low average index score for the CFL teachers’ KSMs on finals (M = .88; SD = .91) revealed that the CFL teachers’ performance in pointing out the CFL students’ final mistakes was relatively restricted compared to that concerning initials and tones. The low SD (M = 5.83; SD = .98) for the various mistakes indicated that the CFL students from all three mastery levels made mistakes concerning the pronunciation of Chinese finals, such as /ɤ/, /iε/, and/iŋ/. These mistakes were primarily caused by a negative transfer of students’ native languages. We also noticed that the CFL teachers were mainly concerned about students’ pronunciation of finals, which were easily confused by students: /ɤ/, /iε/, /yε/, /in/, /iŋ/, /iɑu/, /iou/, /ie/, and /ai/.
The teachers’ KSMs regarding intonation (M = .68; SD = .72) and stress (M = .43; SD = .59) reflected the lowest index scores. The CFL teachers pointed out that students’ mistakes concerning intonation mainly related to ‘no pauses in the sentences’, ‘no intonation in the sentences’ for beginning-level students, ‘no rising intonation in particular questions’, and ‘no falling intonation in particular questions’ for intermediate- and advanced-level students. However, the CFL teachers failed to mention the mistakes in students’ performance concerning a rising intonation in declarative sentences. The tone sandhi mistakes made by students in more than two-word combinations were also ignored by the CFL teachers. Regarding the CFL teachers’ KSMs on stress, only one clarification was highlighted, that is, ‘no stress on appropriate words’. Moreover, the number of teachers agreeing with this clarification was relatively small – only six teachers. No further clarifications were made by the CFL teachers concerning the types of stress to which the mistakes were related. Furthermore, the CFL teachers also neglected the different pronunciation characteristics of stress considering different types of sentences; therefore, this type of mistake was missed by the CFL teachers.
Overall, the results showed that the CFL teachers had limited KSMs regarding intonation, especially stress, regardless of the general index score they obtained or the variety of mistakes they detected.
4 Knowledge of instructional strategies (KIS)
To examine the CFL teachers’ instructional strategies for teaching Chinese pronunciation, their mean and SD for KIS are presented in Table 7. The 20 CFL teachers were invited to react to six CFL students’ mistakes from different mastery levels and to indicate how they would address these during their teaching. The teachers also had to consider different examples based on the students’ Chinese language mastery level. The calculation of the index score for each pronunciation facet followed the strategy lists mentioned in Li et al. (2021) and Liu’s (2019) on teaching Chinese pronunciation.
Mean scores (M) and standard deviations (SD) of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ knowledge of instructional strategies (KIS) index scores for five Chinese pronunciation aspects.
The results reveal that the CFL teachers’ KIS index scores are the highest in terms of tones, followed by initials and intonation, and the lowest for stress. Based on the three mastery levels of the six CFL students, we categorized the strategies proposed by the CFL teachers regarding the six students’ mistakes into three groups: beginning, intermediate, and advanced level groups. Considering the different language mastery levels, group differences (see in Table 8) concerning initials were significant between the advanced and beginning levels (p <.001) and between the intermediate and beginning levels; however, no significant differences were found between the intermediate and advanced levels.
Differences between strategies used by Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers for all three language levels.
The details of the instructional strategies provided by the CFL teachers are presented in Appendix 2 in supplemental material, and show that 18 different strategies were proposed by the CFL teachers for addressing beginning-level students’ mastery of initials. Most strategies can be labeled as ‘controlling instructional strategies’ rather than ‘interactive strategies’. Controlling instructional strategies refer to strategies in which teachers play a dominant role and students’ answers can be predicted by teachers. The entire activity is thus controlled by the teacher. In contrast, interactive strategies mainly relate to strategies in which students are the main actors and intensively interact with other students based on open-ended tasks or activities. The whole activity is communication-oriented and negotiable for students (Baker, 2014). This suggests that teachers adopt a rather teacher-centered approach in the instruction of Chinese initials. When we consider these 18 strategies in detail, we observe the following as the most-frequently mentioned by teachers: minimal pair exercises (5 teachers), drill exercises (4 teachers), physical production activities (4 teachers), and object-aid demonstration (e.g. using certain objects, such as candles or paper to help explain particular initials) (4 teachers). Minimal pair exercises reflect how CFL teachers arrange similar initials into pairs during instruction, such as /tɕ/ vs. /tɕʰ/, /ts/ vs. /tsʰ/, /t/ vs. /tʰ/, and /ʂ/ vs. /s/. Due to the aspiration characteristics of some Chinese initials, object-aid demonstration practices and physical production activities were also often explicitly adopted by the CFL teachers, such as using candles, paper, or hands to instruct /tɕʰ/, /tsʰ/, and /tʰ/. Drill exercises were among the most widely used strategies to rehearse and consolidate language pronunciation. Shifting to intermediate-level students, 11 instructional strategies could be identified by the CFL teachers’ reactions to the mistakes. Minimal pair exercises (2 teachers) and peer correction (2 teachers) were the most widely used strategies. Although students assumed a dominant role in the peer correction strategy, their responses were nevertheless highly predictable, which implied that teachers were aware of the mistakes they made and the corrections students could provide. As such, a peer correction strategy can also be seen as a controlling instructional strategy. Therefore, similar to beginning-level students’ initial instructions, controlling strategies dominated the intermediate-level students’ instruction on initials. Concerning the CFL teachers’ instructional strategies to deal with advanced-level students’ initials, six strategies were mentioned. An over-articulation strategy was mentioned twice. Overall, controlling instructional strategies seem to be dominant when teachers address pronunciation problems and mistakes. The variety of instructional strategies decreases with students’ mastery level. Minimal pair exercises were used in all three mastery levels.
The analysis of instructional strategies mentioned by teachers to address pronunciation finals reflects comparable findings. Among the thirteen strategies used for instructing beginning-level students’ final mistakes, minimal pair exercises (3 teachers) and production exercises (3 teachers) were most frequently mentioned. Again, all strategies seem to be controlling in nature; no interactive strategies were adopted. In terms of intermediate-level students’ mistakes, the CFL teachers provided ten strategies to cope with pronunciation finals. ‘Peer correction’ was the only strategy during which students played a major role in the training. Regarding the other nine strategies, the teachers assumed a leading role since students’ responses were highly predicted. Each strategy was mentioned only once. Three different strategies were used to improve advanced-level students’ problems with initials. ‘Explanation’ was mentioned twice, while a free strategy ‘game’ was included once and for the first time. This instructional strategy is student-centered, and builds on the collaborations between students that might result in unpredictable responses (Baker, 2014). Again, the quantity and variety of strategies decreased with increasing student language mastery level.
Regarding the specific strategies presented by the CFL teachers to improve tone, 28 strategies were mentioned: ‘Five-degree notation map aid explanation’ (6 teachers), ‘body gesture aid production’ (6 teachers), and ‘checking activity’ (5 teachers). These strategies, especially ‘five-degree notation map aid explanation’ and ‘body gesture aid production’, are closely related to Chinese tone features. Regular pronunciation strategies, such as ‘one-to-one drilling exercise’ (4 teachers), ‘one-to-one correction’ (4 teachers), and ‘minimal pair exercises’ (4 teachers) were also widely used by the CFL teachers. It was also found that all the strategies were controlling in nature, which meant that the students’ responses were highly predictable. No free strategies or communication-oriented interactive strategies were observed. Three student-centered strategies were cited: ‘self-correction’ (1 teacher), ‘recitation in pairs and scores’ (1 teacher), and ‘pair production activity’ (1 teacher). However, again, regarding these strategies, student responses are predictable. With respect to intermediate-level students, 15 strategies were identified: ‘Checking activity’ (3 teachers), ‘echo-reading’ (2 teachers), ‘review activity’ (2 teachers), ‘visual-aid recognition’ (2 teachers), ‘pronunciation exaggeration activity’ (2 teachers), and ‘tone pair production and correction’ (2 teachers). For advanced-level students, thirteen strategies were mentioned by the CFL teachers: ‘Explanation’ strategy (2 teachers) and the other strategies were mentioned only once; all the strategies to improve students’ tones were controlling in nature. Approximately twice as many strategies were mentioned for beginning-level students as for intermediate- and advanced-level students.
The data on the CFL teachers’ instructional strategies to address beginning-level students’ intonation show a majority of controlling strategies; however, two interactive strategies were included: ‘drama’ and ‘role play’. Among the twelve controlling strategies, ‘echo-reading’ was the top strategy used: students imitated what they heard from the teacher. ‘Explanation and examples’ (2 teachers), ‘imitation’ (2 teachers), and ‘correction’ strategies (2 teachers) were next in order of appearance. Explaining features of Chinese intonation precedes student pronunciation activity, followed by a feedback loop to correct utterances. Similar to the number of controlling strategies used for beginning-level students, eight of the twelve strategies for intermediate-level students are labeled as such. ‘Echo-reading’ (2 teachers) and ‘listening and drilling exercises’ (2 teachers) were the two main strategies.
‘Instructional strategies’ designed in naturalistic environments were also included. This implies that teachers did not restrict their teaching to the traditional classroom setting, but also allowed students to choose – next to the topic – the instruction location. This is expected to reduce stress and foster a natural acquisition of intonation. Two related strategies were presented by the teachers: ‘practicing with native-language people’ and ‘context-related production activities’. Students practice free talking or speak about topics closely related to the context (e.g. when the classroom setting is a garden, the teacher would focus on garden-related language usage by an individual or group of students). This indicated that the CFL teachers gradually paid more attention to communication-oriented strategies. Regarding advanced-level students’ intonation, seven strategies were presented. With the exception of ‘practicing with native-language people’ and ‘context-related production activity’, the other five strategies can be labeled as teacher-directed strategies. Therefore, we conclude that controlling strategies remain dominant in the strategies to teach pronunciation, even at the different language mastery levels. ‘Explanation and examples’, ‘correction’, and ‘creating immersion context’ reappear at each mastery level.
Compared to the other four aspects, the CFL teachers’ KIS in relation to stress is much more limited. Six strategies to instruct stress to beginning students were mentioned. All six are controlling strategies. ‘Dubbing exercises’ was mentioned for the first time, which meant that students dubbed particular films chosen by the teacher. In terms of instructional strategies to develop intermediate-level students’ stress, ‘checking activity’ (2 teachers), ‘stress-emphasized production activity’ (2 teachers), and ‘correction’ (2 teachers) strategies were mentioned most frequently. Similar to the strategies used to support beginning-level students, controlling strategies were clearly dominant in all seven strategies. Only two strategies were geared to support advanced-level students’ stress: a checking activity and a production-student feedback activity. Considering the mastery in the three levels, the data reveal that teachers dominate the instructional process in stress pronunciation instruction. All strategies seem to focus on sentence-level stress; word-level stress was ignored. In addition, the variety and frequency of strategies used for stress were much lower than those for the other four Chinese pronunciation aspects. No interactive strategies were provided.
Overall, the CFL teachers’ KIS index scores were the highest for tones, finals, and initials. The CFL teachers seem to reflect a rather limited KIS regarding teaching intonation and stress. This might be caused by the fact that CFL teachers spend very little time on training suprasegments, as initials, finals, and tones are regarded as the most important pronunciation aspects to teach at the beginning level. With regard to intermediate- and advanced-level students, instructional strategies for developing grammar and vocabulary teaching are the focus in a CFL class. Nevertheless, many students continue to struggle with problematic pronunciation. Therefore, suprasegment pronunciation instruction was largely ignored by the CFL teachers, which helps to explain why the CFL teachers showed limited KIS for intonation and stress.
5 Knowledge of Media (KM)
The CFL teachers typically utilized certain media in the strategies they presented. Table 9 shows the mean and SD for the media that the 20 teachers used in their strategies. The calculation of the index score was based on Ye (2003) and Huang and Navarre (2019) concerning media utilization for Chinese pronunciation teaching.
Mean score (M) and standard deviation (SD) of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ knowledge of media (KM) on five Chinese pronunciation aspects.
Table 7 summarizes the mean and SD for the index reflecting the CFL teachers’ use of media in teaching Chinese pronunciation. The descriptive analyses revealed that the CFL teachers reported a stronger KM on teaching initials (M = .28; SD = .51) and tones (M = .29; SD = .59). The CFL teachers reported a limited KM in the context of teaching stress (M = .04; SD = .20). We also noticed that some instructional media were dominant in the instruction of Chinese pronunciation, for instance, teachers’ use of self-prepared printed materials and textbooks (see Appendix 3 in supplemental material). However, the media used for each pronunciation aspect still differed, and seemed to be highly influenced by the characteristics of each Chinese pronunciation aspect.
In terms of the CFL teachers’ KM on teaching initials, objects (hand/paper) were frequently mentioned for teaching aspirated and unaspirated initials to all levels of students. Articulator and Articulator lingual maps were used for teaching beginning-level students’ initials; thus, students could clearly know the exact position of the tongue when producing an initial. Audio textbooks or other audio resources were used to train beginning-level and intermediate-level students’ initials in drilling and audio-aid identification exercises. The types of media used decreased from the context of beginning-level to that of advanced-mastery level students, which paralleled the decrease in the instructional strategies reported earlier. Computer or mobile devices were very rarely mentioned and only occurred twice: once for intermediate- and once for advanced-level students.
Compared to initials, significantly fewer media were reported for teaching CFL students’ finals. Teachers’ self-prepared materials were used at all three mastery levels. Audio was mentioned once regarding beginning- and advanced-level students. We noticed that textbooks were only used once by the CFL teachers to deal with beginning-level students’ finals. This suggests that the CFL teachers preferred using their own materials (such as articular lingual map and teachers’ self-made pinyin charts) and adopted their own teaching ‘scenario’ when teaching finals. Mirrors were used to enable students to watch the opening size of their mouths when pronouncing single, compound, and nasal finals. Computer use was mentioned once in ‘phonetic notation aid recognition exercise’.
Although the strategies mentioned by the CFL teachers to improve students’ tones showed considerable variety, the use of different media remained limited. Mandarin tone contour charts and hand and body gestures were used to support the instruction of beginning- and intermediate-level students, to visually show the rising and falling pitch contours and pitch levels of the four tones. Music, audios, videos, and Chinese films were widely used at all three mastery levels to help students imitate the tones. Teachers’ self-prepared materials (such as tone combinations) were also used at all three mastery levels.
Switching to the CFL teachers’ KM on intonation, teachers’ self-prepared materials and textbooks were most widely mentioned. Audios and videos from textbooks or other resources were used at all three mastery levels to create an immersive atmosphere and to help students to imitate the ‘correct’ intonations. The variety of media used in training intonation was much lower than that of the media used in relation to initials, finals, and tones. No special media were designed for training Chinese intonations, such as Praat.
We noticed that textbooks were used as the most frequent media type to develop students’ stress in their pronunciation. Audios, textbook videos, and teachers’ self-prepared videos were used to help students to identify and imitate the correct stress in sentences.
Overall, we noticed that media usage varied for the different aspects of teaching Chinese pronunciation, especially for initials and tones, and that choice was motivated by the particular phonetic features of Chinese initials and tones. The use of videos and audios for training intonation and stress was mentioned more frequently. This was often related to the aim of creating an immersion atmosphere and helping students to imitate suprasegments. We also discovered that textbooks were by far the most commonly used medium. Obviously, the CFL teachers like to prepare their own materials. This was often linked to the limited availability of content or exercises in current CFL textbooks or workbooks. Computer software or mobile devices were only used with regard to developing students’ initials and finals, while overall, their use remained limited.
IV Discussion
In the following paragraphs, we summarize and discuss the major findings for each PCK element and point out implications for CFL pronunciation teaching.
1 CFL teachers’ limited PCK of teaching Chinese intonation and stress
Our first research question attempted to characterize the nature of CFL teachers’ PCK of teaching different aspects of Chinese pronunciation. With a much lower mean index score for intonation (M = 1.75; SD = 3.16) and stress (M = 1.5; SD = 2.35), we can question whether the CFL teachers master adequate and sufficient knowledge to teach the full complexity of Chinese pronunciation. This in-service teachers’ limited PCK can be explained by their limited KSM. Yuan (2020) investigated questions related to phonetic topics in the Certificate for Teachers of Chinese to Speakers of Other Language study; the results showed that questions concerning stress (4 examination questions) and intonation (4 examination questions) were less frequent. Moreover, a much lower proportion of suprasegmental questions was screened (8 examination questions) than of questions focusing on initials (11), finals (8), and tones (22). This suggests that intonation and stress might generally be neglected by CFL educators, resulting in the CFL teachers’ vague explanations of concepts related to the instruction of intonation and stress.
Concerning KC, when teaching intonation and stress, CFL teachers should set clearer and appropriate goals for the related instruction. Deng (2020) found that CFL teachers typically taught tones with single words instead of disyllabic words, and that the training of intonation and stress was largely ignored. Chinese prosodic constituents include the syllable, foot, prosodic word, prosodic / phonological phrase, and breath group / prosodic group (Yang, 2016). Due to these prosodic features, therefore, the prosody patterns of polysyllabic words and phrases in a sentence are different from the tone of single words in the sentence; concretely, intonation or other pragmatic functions may influence the actual realization of tones (Tseng et al., 2005). In other words, accurately pronouncing tones does not equally mean accurately pronouncing prosody. CFL pronunciation researchers should therefore develop a specific curriculum for teaching Chinese prosody, for CFL teachers to have clearer instructions to guide their prosody training.
The absence of a curriculum for teaching Chinese prosody and limitations of subject matters on Chinese prosody may have caused the CFL teachers’ weakness in finding CFL students’ mistakes concerning Chinese intonation and stress. Until now, research on Chinese prosody has mainly focused on theories of intonation contours or borrowed relevant generalizations in the L2 prosodic theoretical studies that can be applied to teaching strategies (Tseng et al., 2005), instead of drawing specific conclusions about Chinese intonation patterns and formulating some general teaching rules based on these findings. This has directly led to a situation in which CFL teachers cannot use the knowledge they have acquired concerning intonation and stress to clearly differentiate the specific intonation and stress mistakes made by CFL students and explain each mistake in detail (Yang, 2019). This suggests that CFL teachers should learn to identify the different intonation patterns of different sentences and types of phonological stress in Chinese, which would enhance their ability to identify different mistakes and clearly communicate them to CFL students (Wen, 2014; Yang, 2016).
The results of the CFL teachers’ performance on KIS echo the results of earlier research that activities that focus on lower-level perception and production of intonation and stress patterns (listening exercises and controlled speaking exercises) constitute most of the approaches adopted (Yang, 2019). Research on L2 (Flege, 1999) and Chinese pronunciation acquisition (Chun, 2002) has demonstrated that students who have difficulties with the production of particular pronunciation items also have very low accuracy concerning the perception of those pronunciation items. Only two of the 20 teachers in the present study used ‘listening and drilling exercises’ to train students in acquiring intonation with both perception and production exercises. Moreover, the listening exercises were conducted without visual input. However, audio-visual training has proven to enhance students’ awareness of phonological / phonetic acoustic characteristics of L2 pronunciation, and help students to acquire prosodic patterns (Deng & Lin, 2017). With visual input, students can contextualize the contour and pitch levels of an utterance they have heard and imitate the words, phrases, or utterances more easily (Chun et al., 2015; Huang & Navarre, 2019). Regarding regular imitation exercises, such as ‘echo-reading’, ‘imitation’, and ‘correction’, CFL students were usually allocated sufficient time to listen to and then repeat the CFL teachers’ pronunciation. However, considering that intonation and stress exercises typically happen at intermediate- or advanced-mastery levels and the practicing time is limited, the exercises that are used by CFL teachers to train CFL students’ intonation and stress should incorporate more effective exercises, such as shadowing practice; Chinese intonation or stress strategies should be designed based on the requirements for teaching students at different levels. Communicative strategies should also be included as much as possible to improve CFL students’ comprehensibility and intelligibility (Zhang, 2006). In addition to the two communicative strategies currently used by the CFL teachers, interactive in-class oral tasks (teachers provide specific communicative topics and let students discuss in pairs) or interactive alignment (teachers align particular intonation or stress patterns and let students produce those patterns based on different communicative functions) could be employed. Furthermore, out-of-class oral practicing strategies can also be adopted by CFL students to practice question-statement intonation and stress, especially for advanced-level students, such as using speech analysis software (e.g. Praat or Audacity software, showing students’ ‘voice picture’ in real-time) or online communicative coursework (e.g. Moodle, with an implanted recording tool, PoodLL, can be easily combined with CFL teaching); however, these strategies also require CFL teachers to design different types of intonation and stress exercises and make them available online, so that they can evaluate students’ performance status and provide real-time feedback.
The media used by the CFL teachers to instruct students’ intonation and stress were more explicit than those for teaching the other four pronunciation aspects. However, the media types were limited to textbooks, textbook audios, and textbook videos. Other technologies were rarely used by the interviewed CFL teachers. This may be due to the limited equipment available in the teaching institutions, or the CFL teachers’ limited media expertise. Given the rapid development of Web 2.0 technologies, more communication and social media tools / platforms can be implemented by CFL instructors to teach Chinese, such as YouTube, Podcasting, Quizlet, Wechat, QQ, Skype, etc. (Luo & Yang, 2016). With a phone device or laptop, students can use these social media tools in their daily lives and orally communicate with people in real-life situations. This illustrates how CFL teachers could use these social media tools / platforms to design audio assignments to train CFL students’ intonation and stress abilities. CFL teachers also need to realize the potentially different role they will play in training students’ intonation and stress when moving to more authentic communication situations. For example, providing appropriate tools for different training items and real-time, well-thought feedback on students’ mistakes (Stickler & Shi, 2013).
2 CFL teachers’ limited PCK of teaching intermediate- and advanced-level students’ pronunciation
Our study systematically assessed the CFL teachers’ PCK of teaching Chinese pronunciation. We found that the mean index score for the CFL teachers’ PCK of teaching beginning-mastery level students was significantly higher than that for dealing with intermediate- and advanced-level students. This is consistent with previous research findings that CFL teachers lack explicit knowledge in teaching Chinese pronunciation, which means that most CFL teachers know common strategies of teaching Chinese pronunciation but lack the specific knowledge to linguistically explain the phonetic items involved (Liu, 2019). This applies to the teaching of CFL students at all levels, especially advanced-level students. This situation suggests that professional development of explicit linguistic knowledge of Chinese pronunciation is of great importance, especially for teaching high-level CFL students. These students have already learned the basics of Chinese pronunciation and expect to receive clearer and more specific instructions on how to address the mistakes that remain at their advanced level.
Additionally, analyses of CFL teachers’ KC have shown that their difficulties in setting goals and standards for intermediate- and advanced-level students are typically affected by a lack of curriculum guidance on teaching Chinese pronunciation. Some experienced teachers can design appropriate goals and standards, considering CFL students’ different mastery levels; however, such teachers remain few. Most CFL teachers still follow the sequences of the Chinese Hanyu pinyin charts to teach Chinese segments (Deng, 2020) and the rules for tones to teach Chinese tones and tone sandhi. In addition, the goal of speech intelligibility and comprehensibility has received increasing attention for L2 pronunciation instructors (Derwing & Munro, 1997; Kennedy & Trofimovich, 2008; Munro & Derwing, 2015); this is also true for Chinese pronunciation instruction, especially for intermediate- and advanced-level students. Therefore, there is a need for CFL educators to formulate guidance on pronunciation teaching at all mastery levels, based on the principles of accentedness, intelligibility, and comprehensibility.
Our findings are consistent with those obtained by Li et al. (2021) regarding CFL beginners. They also found that the instructional strategies implemented in the pronunciation instruction for intermediate- and advanced-level students were limited and their efficacy uncertain. Therefore, there is a need for thorough professional development of those who teach intermediate- and advanced-level students, especially considering the restricted in-class time for teaching pronunciation as well as the specific goals concerning the acquisition of oral communicative abilities to improve CFL students’ intelligibility (Levis, 2020).
Finally, CFL teachers should involve more media and technologies in their instruction, especially the adoption of solutions that help students to independently practice outside class. Students like to communicate with native speakers after acquiring a higher language level (Shi & Stickler, 2019); however, this requires CFL teachers to apply appropriate PCK in general and media-related knowledge in particular (for instance, social media knowledge) when teaching pronunciation. Considering that there are no studies that address CFL teachers’ knowledge of using technologies for teaching Chinese pronunciation, future CFL researchers could follow Mishra and Koehler (2006)’s TPCK framework and provide a more comprehensive survey of CFL teachers’ TPCK on teaching Chinese pronunciation. The reason that we did not address this issue in the current study is that there have not yet been any studies on CFL teachers’ PCK of teaching Chinese pronunciation. Therefore, we aimed at presenting the extent to which CFL teachers’ general PCK of teaching Chinese pronunciation was generated; in future research, we could adopt TPCK scales (Chai et al., 2013; Juan et al., 2019) and explore how their KSM, KC, KSMs, KIS, and KM are presented from a more specific perspective, such as using technologies for teaching Chinese pronunciation.
V Theoretical and pedagogical implications
Based on our findings, we suggest several implications for future research and CFL teacher education. This study ultimately proposed a well-defined conceptualization of PCK for CFL pronunciation teaching. CFL teachers’ knowledge of teaching Chinese pronunciation was defined based on five components of the PCK framework to map out a relatively comprehensive picture of CFL teacher knowledge. This unbalanced PCK image sheds light on the reality of pronunciation teaching in actual classes, which means that pronunciation teaching mainly appears in the initial phase of Chinese language teaching (Deng, 2020). Empirical evidence is essential to evaluate the importance of CFL teachers’ PCK in teaching Chinese pronunciation. Based on the overall findings of the present study and those implied by the PCK theory (Kulgemeyer & Riese, 2018; Lyu & Chen, 2021), CFL teachers reflect a better mastery of KSM when teaching tones, initials, and finals, than when teaching intonation and stress (Yang, 2011, 2016; Zhang, 2006). In addition, CFL teachers’ KC is unclear regarding setting appropriate pronunciation instruction goals for intermediate- and advanced-level students and knowing and selecting relevant learning environment contexts for teaching particular pronunciation items. Most of the strategies employed by the CFL teachers were controlled rather than communicative. CFL teachers’ pronunciation training should aim at developing a stronger, in-depth knowledge of intonation and stress subject content. In addition, a stronger development of related instructional knowledge seems to be critical for effectively teaching intonation and stress. In particular, strategies used by the CFL teachers to address different-level students’ mistakes were rather similar, which indicates that, to some extent, CFL teachers ignore CFL students’ mastery level in pronunciation teaching. The study also found that the CFL teachers possessed limited KM, which is especially emphasized in TPCK theory (Cai, 2016; Tseng et al., 2020). The CFL teachers chose to use traditional teaching materials and very limited technologies (audios and videos) to instruct CFL students’ pronunciation. This evidence can contribute to the professional development of CFL educators. A curriculum for teaching pronunciation is urgently required for CFL teachers to follow up and design their pronunciation teaching, considering students’ different language mastery levels (Liu, 2019). Policymakers in CFL education institutions are advised to address CFL teachers’ weaknesses and take the necessary measures to help them acquire a comprehensive understanding of the curriculum (Li & Zhang, 2016). Moreover, CFL teachers’ instructional media knowledge base should be widened, integrating appropriate media and technologies for different pronunciation items (Yang, 2019). Finally, considering the focus on CK, specific training of Chinese phonology must be stressed and organized, especially in relation to prosodic knowledge.
VI Limitations and directions for future research
Although our findings are promising, there are limitations. First, the dataset comprises a relatively small sample of CFL instructors teaching Chinese pronunciation. A large-scale analysis of teachers’ PCK is marred by a lack of adequate instruments (Evens et al., 2016). Currently, mostly paper-and-pencil instruments are used to measure teachers’ PCK. The present study adopted a qualitative analysis approach that allowed us to delve deeper into the nature of teachers’ PCK. It is recommended that future studies involve more participants to enlarge the scale (in terms of geographical coverage, years of experience, control for students’ mother tongue, student levels, and longitudinal focus). Second, as already mentioned in Section II.1, the nature of our participant sampling approach could have consequences in terms of neglecting the situated nature of PCK. Although we emphasize control for the higher education setting and a focus on the HSK as a frame of reference, teacher differences and differences in their local teaching contexts could also have contributed to their responses in the study. For instance, our sample comprised both native and non-native Chinese language teachers: 15 Chinese and 5 non-native Chinese CFL teachers. This might cause potential bias due to these differences within the sample. The first bias arises from the different mother tongues (Chinese, Flemish, and Norwegian) of the interviewed CFL teachers. Since we did not use native language as a stratification variable (Triventi, 2013), it is difficult to reach conclusions concerning this point. Some research has been conducted on belief comparisons between native- and non-native CFL teachers (Gu, Wang, & Zhang, 2021) and non-native CFL teachers’ identity constructions (Zhang & Wang, 2017). However, future researchers should also focus on potential critical qualitative differences, such as those concerning native and non-native Chinese CFL teachers’ teaching approaches.
Third, our study is based on a cognitive perspective of teachers’ PCK. Although studies have shown the advantages of examining teachers’ PCK from a cognitive perspective (König & Kramer, 2016; Kunter et al., 2013), there is a danger of ignoring what really happens in class and what really matters in teaching (Depaepe, Verschaffel & Kelchtermans, 2013). Therefore, based on the findings of the present study, it is recommended that future studies use a broader range of assessment instruments to evaluate teachers’ situation-specific skills of interpreting, explaining, and decision-making in their own classroom. In addition, inspired by Borg (2006)’s research that focuses on foreign language teachers’ cognitions and questions about their practices in classrooms, we advocate organizing qualitative studies in CFL classroom settings that examine teachers’ actual instructional behavior. Last, the CFL teachers whom we interviewed were mainly from Dutch- and French-speaking regions. Therefore, to generalize findings about CFL teachers in environments where students speak another mother tongue remains an open question for future research. This issue could also be explored through a comparative analysis of native Chinese versus non-native Chinese CFL teachers concerning their instructional strategies, teaching outcomes, and competence.
VII Conclusions
To summarize, this study can be regarded as an inspiring starting point for further research on CFL teachers’ PCK. It sheds light on future approaches to studying CFL teachers’ PCK of teaching other aspects, such as oral interaction, listening, writing, etc. The results provide a basis for discussing PCK development during CFL teachers’ training and professional development. The study also illustrates that, compared to initials, finals, and tones, CFL teachers clearly lack a deeper understanding of intonation and stress, both on theoretical and practical teaching levels. The results can be seen as a strength-weakness analysis of current CFL approaches in the particular research context and as a benchmark to monitor the design and impact of initiatives for teacher development in the near future.
Research Data
sj-docx-1-ltr-10.1177_13621688221117605 – Research Data for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge in teaching Chinese pronunciation
Research Data, sj-docx-1-ltr-10.1177_13621688221117605 for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge in teaching Chinese pronunciation by Linghong Li, Martin Valcke, Linda Badan and Christoph Anderl in Language Teaching Research
Research Data
sj-docx-2-ltr-10.1177_13621688221117605 – Research Data for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge in teaching Chinese pronunciation
Research Data, sj-docx-2-ltr-10.1177_13621688221117605 for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge in teaching Chinese pronunciation by Linghong Li, Martin Valcke, Linda Badan and Christoph Anderl in Language Teaching Research
Research Data
sj-docx-3-ltr-10.1177_13621688221117605 – Research Data for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge in teaching Chinese pronunciation
Research Data, sj-docx-3-ltr-10.1177_13621688221117605 for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge in teaching Chinese pronunciation by Linghong Li, Martin Valcke, Linda Badan and Christoph Anderl in Language Teaching Research
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
We would like to express our gratitude to the participating students who devoted their time to producing the recordings and to the teachers who took part in the interviews.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Supplemental material
Supplemental material for this article is available online.
References
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
