PRIMARY CHINESE LANGUAGE INSTRUCTION IN THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA

This study gives an introduction to the Chinese language including a brief history of its development, and a description of the changes its writing system has undergone up to the present time in the People's Republic of China. It examines the current methods and materials for teaching beginning reading and the standard dialect of Chinese in the People's Republic of China to children of different dialects. Conclusions are drawn regarding the application of these practices to other languages and countries. The Chinese written language is the world's oldest living written language and has been in existence for thousands of years. Over the course of this time, it has undergone many changes, and been taught to millions of readers. Chinese is unique on the continuum of the world's written languages because of its use of characters. While more people speak Chinese than any other world language, it is often considered the most difficult of the world's languages to learn to read (Wang, 1973). In order to be considered minimally literate, elementary school graduates in China must learn to read slightly more than 3,000 characters.