A review of technology-enhanced Chinese character teaching and learning in a digital context

The acquisition of Chinese characters has been widely acknowledged as challenging for learners of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) due to their unique logographic nature and the time and effort involved. However, recent advancements in instructional technologies demonstrate a promising role in facilitating the teaching and learning of Chinese characters. This paper examines studies exploring technology-enhanced character teaching and learning (TECTL) through a systematic literature review of relevant publications produced between 2010 and 2021. The synthesized findings shed insights on the research undertaken in the TECTL field, identifying a focus on characters’ component disassembling, re-assembling, and associations among orthography, semantics, and phonology. In addition, learners’ perceptions toward the use of technology and the benefits of various types of technological tools are also discussed in detail. Implications for TECTL are also put forward for future pedagogical practice and exploration

Investigating Relationships Among Measures of English and Chinese Handwriting Fluency in Early-Elementary Chinese Dual Language Immersion Students

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationships between English and Chinese handwriting fluency measures in early-elementary Chinese Dual Language Immersion students. This was done by conducting five handwriting fluency tasks among Chinese Dual Language Immersion students and comparing the findings. First, the findings showed that there was a moderate correlation between the participants\u27 English and Chinese handwriting fluencies and that English fluencies predicted Chinese fluencies. However, the students could write English numbers and letters much faster than Chinese characters. Second, as expected, Chinese DLI participants showed that handwriting fluency improved as grade level increased. Third, third-grade students were not much faster than second-grade students on both English number and English Chinese number tasks. The study informs Chinese DLI programs as it shows that supplemental handwriting instruction is likely necessary to narrow the differences between English and Chinese handwriting fluencies. Instructional amount and quality could be improved to increase Chinese fluency, and English and Chinese partner teachers should collaborate more closely and complement each other\u27s handwriting instructional efforts. In summary, this study identifies significant differences in English and Chinese handwriting fluencies, and further studies may be necessary to consider ways to address these differences

SoundScript - Supporting the acquisition of character writing by multisensory integration

This work is introducing a new movement sonification method called 'SoundScript' to support the acquisition of character writing by children. SoundScript creates 'sound traces' from the writing trace in real-time during the process of handwriting. The structural correlation of both - optic and acoustic - traces leads to an integrated audio-visual perception of writing with the expected stimulation of multisensory integration sites of the CNS. Data of a pilot study are introduced indicating that the writing kinematics is reproduced more adequately if additional sound traces are available during writing. In the future SoundScript shall be applied to verify if the establishment of internal character representations can be accelerated, if the conciseness of the specific shape of the particular characters can be made stronger and if thereby the efficiency of the handwriting learning process can be enhanced