Zhen Ye and Chiu-ching Tseng

TSL-5371- Fall 2013

Professor: Aixa Perez-Prado, Ph.D.
December 03, 2013
Mini lesson

Title:
Introduction to Chinese Tonal.
Class profile:
Adult beginners 20~25 students.
Standards Addressed:
Engaging Students Speaking, Reading, and Listening skills.
Using the most commonly known Chinese word (Ma) in Linguistics
study.
Content Objective(s):
Introduce Chinese Phonology to students.
A quick glimpse of Chinese word-order (e.g. M M / q / M i.e. an
S/V/O).
Practice 4 basic tones.
Intend to reduce the misconception of "Chinese is difficult" in
students' mind.
Understand "get four for one" in both tonal and vocab.
Language Specific Objectives:
At the end of the lesson, students:
Will learn at least four new words in Chinese with one syllable.
Able to distinguish the four tones.
Able to match drawings and words to guess Chinese characters.
Able to play tongue twister in Chinese
Class Note:
Language used would mostly be Chinese Mandarin with association
of body language.
Extra activity (matching game and a new set of words) is prepared in
case of surplus time.
Involving Audio-lingual, TPR, Communicative Approach, and ESOL-ish
approaches.
This lesson is:
Authentic - Students will listen/read/produce genuine Chinese.
Personal and meaningful we will ask extended questions to
students and we will use body language to make them
understand.
Visual and graphic organized picture, drawings and PowerPoint
are used.
Multicultural - Speakers of Chinese, English, Spanish, and etc.
Cooperative and Interactive - Work together to solve tasks.
H.O.T.S. - high order thinking skill is involved to match drawings
and shapes of the Chinese characters, and perhaps learning a
brand new language does involve H.O.T.S.

Adaptable - Ma is the focus, and Explanation of Pictograms or

Onomatopoeia of Chinese can be limited to minimum, and the
speed of the tongue twister is certainly adjustable according to
students' reaction.
Habits of mind:
Question to solve the tasks,
Responding with wonderment and awe,
Being open-mind to other culture,
Apply past knowledge to new situation,
and etc.
Materials Preparation:
1. Handout1: Chinese words would/might be used during the task +
Tongue twister script.
2. Handout2: Match game of 6 pictures to 6 target words.(first page of
the pptx)
3. Index cards to group students into 4 groups.

Lesson Phases:
Stage 1: Pre-task (engage): (5~10 minutes)
1 Greetings in Chinese, distribute handout (~15 Sec)
2 Using twenty trump cards to group students into four groups. (4
groups: M group, M group, M group, M group). (~30 Sec)
3 Distributing handouts.
4 Matching activity (group work). (using the handout 2, 2 minutes)
5 Showing answers. (~1minute)
6 Asking questions: (~3minute)
o Jenny will ask the first question: Does anyone have children? (Ask
2 or 3 students and extended question will be asked accordingly,
e.g. how many children do you have? and write on the
whiteboard.)
o Ken will ask the second question: Does anyone plant hemp?
(Extended question: does anyone know what the usage of hemp
is? and write on the whiteboard.)
o Jenny will ask the third question: Does anyone ride the horse?
(Extended question: what kind of horse? and write on the
whiteboard)
o Ken will ask the fourth question: Does anyone scold people?
(Extended question: who you scolded? write on the whiteboard.)
Stage 2: During-task (study): (5~7 minutes)
1. Introduce today's topic-the Chinese tonal. (~1minute)
2. Make students repeat words on the board after us, and using their
hands to address the , , , and. (Repeat twice, the first time in
slow speed and then repeat in quick speed, about 2~3minutes for the
repetitions)
3. Point to the four group randomly to make the group members to
pronounce their
group tonal. (~1minute)

4. Go over the tone twister: (5~6minute)

M M q M, M Mn, M M M M
,
Stage 3: Post-task (activate): (5~7 minutes)
1 Group practice. (~1minute)
2 In order to giving students an example, two teachers repeat the
Chinese tone twister and time them to find out the winner.
3 Choose one volunteer from each group to repeat the Chinese tone
twister, and time them respectively. (1~2minute)
4 Find out who is the winner. (~1minute)
5 One more last practice on four Ma tones(with hand cue).

Handout1:
Word/phrase

Pronunciation

Translation

, ,

N, w, t

You, I, He/she

ho

Well/Good

D ji ho

Hello/how are you, everyone?

Jntin

Today

Yq

Together

Xu

Learn

Fyn

Pronunciation

four

Shng

Sound/tone

Yu Shu

Right hand

Mn

Slow

Lo Gng

Husband

Hu

Flower

Ride

Yu X

Game

Xiohi

Children

Ro Ku Lng

Tongue twisters

Lin Lin Kn

Match game

Xi Xi

Thanks!

Tongue Twister:

M M q M, M Mn, M M M M

Chinese in a nutshell:
There are approximately 47,000 to 90,000 Chinese characters including various dialects and
lent-words to some Asian countries. However, native adult speakers of Mandarin averagely use
about 4,000~8,000 words. Furthermore, a university professor might have knowledge of 20,000+
words. Some research did reveal that possessing 2,000 Chinese characters would be efficient to get
by everyday life without any difficulty.

SCIRPT AND STEPS (Chinese)

T:K:J:T:T:T:
J:
K:()
~~~~~~~~~~~1, (K&J )~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~2,( HANDOUT#1)~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
K: J
J:
""(""K )
J:""
K&J:()
K:
J:()
J:?(:)
K:
K:?
J:
K:?

K: ma
T:
T:~~~~~~~~~~~~
T:~~~~~~~~~~~~
T:~~~~~~~~~~~~
T:~~~~~~~~~~~~
K:
K:()()
K:!
J: ()()
J: !
K:
K::(ba)
J:(po)
K:""()
K:
J:?()
K: ?()
K:()
J:()
K:
K:?()
~~~~~(K J ))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
J:~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
T:////?()
T::: ()

T:

SCRIPT & STEPS(English)

T: Hello, Teacher. K:Hello, Ma'am. J:Hello, Sir. T: Hello, you. T:Hello, me.
T: Hello, everyone.
J:

Today, we are going to learn the four Chinese tones together.

K: First of all, Let's make four groups. Please, everyone draws one card.(There will be groupMon, group-hemp, group-horse, and group-scolder.)
~~~~~~~~1, (K&J each take 10 cards to walk around and have each student draws one)~~~~~
~~~~~~~~2,(After the grouping, distribute handout #1)~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
K: Please look at the screen. This is a matching-game that we are going to play! Let's have J
teacher explain how to play.
J:

First, connect the pot from the picture to the English definition, then look at the picture and
guess the Ancient Chinese, then to the modern Chinese. For example the female.(shape is the
key, and K will control the power point slides)

J:

Okay, let's work together to solve the task. (K&J will walk around to help).

K: Very good! Let's check out the answers.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------J:

Okay, then Let me a question, who is a mother?

J: how many children do you have? (to whoever raise her hand, and give number cues for student
to answer.)
K: Who like to grow plants and flower.
K: have you ever plant hemps?
J:

please raise your hand if you have ever ridden on a horse.(cues "YES", "NO")

K: Who has ever scolded your kids or husband? .

K: Yes! "Ma" is today's topic. That's right! " M M M M" four tones.
T: Everyone rent us your right-hand and follow our lead.
T: M ~~~~~~ M ~~~~~~

T: M ~~~~~~ M ~~~~~~
T: M ~~~~~~ M ~~~~~~
T: M ~~~~~~ M ~~~~~~
K: Wonderful! Very good!
K: (point to a student) how about you try.(repeat)
K: Well-done!
J:

(point to a different student) how about you try. (repeat)

J:

Good job!

K: If you learn these four tones, you can use to predict on any syllables, and apply the tone(s).
K: For example, "b b b b "
J:

Or, "p p p p "

K: Now, let's use what we have just learnedto play a little game. It's called a "tongue twisters".
K: Please look at the screen.
J:

Who is this? (pointing at the female)

K: what is this? (pointing at the horse)

K: This Mon is riding the horse therefore, it is "Mon rides horse(M M q M)"
J:

However, This horse is very slow.

K: Yup!, This horse is very slow, therefore, it is "horse slow(M Mn)"

K: Therefore, Mon scolds the horse(M M M M).
K: With me so far?(some body language, two thumbs up or shake head, etc)
~~~~(K & J both demonstrate one time.( measure the time and write on the board)~~~~
J:

We'll have one volunteer from each team to compete

T: Congratulation to ???(If there is surplus time, ask for one student to challenge teachers' record.
T: Finally, everyone's hand up! M M M M
T: Thank you everyone!