Integrating Children's Literature into Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language Curriculum

Abstract

The purpose of this project was to integrate children's literature into the teaching Chinese as a foreign language curriculum for students in their beginning level of learning Chinese. Through literature review and previous studies, the reasons for using children's literature and criteria for choosing children's literature in a foreign language classroom were investigated. The activities and achievements students can gain in using children's literature in a foreign language classroom were also presented. The criteria for selecting children's literature for teaching Chinese as a foreign language curriculum were derived accordingly. Seventy seven children's picture books were selected for this project with three language resources of English, bilingual with English and Chinese, and Chinese. An annotated bibliography was provided and eighteen lesson plans were created to demonstrate how these children's picture books integrate into teaching Chinese as a foreign language curriculum. Limitations and implications of this project were also discussed with recommendations for further research.