On November 23rd, Marxism School held a lecture on Mandarin skills trainingf or normal students. Xu Guangping was invited as the keynote speaker, who is the associate professor of Liberal Arts School, national-level Mandarin tester and vice president of Zhenjiang Recitation Art Association. Moreover, Professor Jiang Junming, vice president of Marxism School, presided over the lecture, and all undergraduate students of Grade 19 and Grade 20 of Ideological and Political Education (Normal) major listened to the lecture. Besides, Lu Ying, deputy director of the teaching and research section of ideological and political major, participated in the activity.
Professor Xu compared the Mandarin proficiency test scale and the assessment score sheet to comprehensively explain the requirements and goals of normal Chinese training for normal students from the aspects of Chinese character syllable structure, common phonetic errors correction, speech flow, phonetic changes, reading short passages, and propositional speaking. Afterwards, Professor Xu focused on reading single-syllable words and two-syllable words, subsequently, introduced in detail the pronunciation skills including “stretching zygomaticus, opening mandibular joint, exercising soft palate, loosing jaw” of opening the mouth by harmonizing the phonology of Chinese characters, and combined with typical vocabulary and tongue twisters, furthermore, he led the students to discover and understand their pronunciation problems in the process of reading aloud and correct them in time. In the end, Professor Xu emphasized that while paying attention to the standard degree of phonological tone, we should pay more attention to the degree of sound change, pause, intonation and fluency, at last, he shared the basic methods and precautions of propositional speech.
This lecture was highly instructive and pertinent, which further helped students to understand the content of Mandarin training and the requirements of Mandarin proficiency test more comprehensively. It also summarized and pointed out the possible misunderstandings of students in their usual Mandarin practice. The students unanimously agreed that they have gained quite a lot.
