Teach English in ShuangliuZhen - Bazhong Shi

In the 21st century knowledge of English language is an important prerequisite for the successful employment in the labor exchange. Students from all over the world strive to learn English, as it is the most influential international language, which is easily explained by the colonial policy of the British Empire in the XIX century and the influence of the United States on world politics in the XX—XXI centuries. Therefore, it is important to study the features of teaching English to students from different countries. There are many reasons why Chinese people are willing to invest so much time and effort in learning English. Since today it is one of the main languages of world communication, its knowledge is a precondition for higher education and career growth. In addition, in modern China, projects that improve and encourage the level of English among the population receive significant support from the state, as contributing to the creation of a positive image of China. Approximately from the first days of working as a non-native English speaker in the Land of Heaven, I had started questioning myself why in China the pronunciation of English sounds in another way in compare with one in my own country. Although, we are learning English twice or three times a week in ECD’s, primary, middle and high schools and even less in Universities in contrast with everyday’s classes in China. Soon I understood that, Chinese and English have many distinctions due to the fact that they belong to dissimilar language families. This makes learning English for Chinese students challenging. The Chinese language does not have an alphabet, but uses a hieroglyphic system in the written language. In the hieroglyphic system, symbols denote a word — that is, a word does not consist of letters, as it is in the case in the English language. Because of these fundamental differentiations in languages, Chinese learners may have serious problems in reading and correctly pronouncing English words. If we talk about pronunciation, in English the minimum unit is a letter, and in Chinese — a syllable (the). This means that the Chinese are accustomed to the fact that each consonant must be accompanied by a vowel. It is difficult for them to pronounce words in which several consonants go in a row, so they "dilute" them with vowels. For instance, the word squirrel they will pronounce as something like ['sə-kə-wɪ-rə-lə]. Sometimes it leads to a funny transliteration of English words. For example, Facebook Chinese jokingly called 非死不可 (fēi sǐ bù kě), which means" you cannot die". Also in Chinese there is no variation between voiced and voiceless consonants, but there is a difference between aspirated and uninspired ( [p] and [pʱ]). Due to the influence of local dialects, some Chinese pronounce n and l equally. Some English sounds (v, th) are simply not present in Chinese phonetics, so they are replaced by something similar. China, unfortunately, cannot boast of a high level of English language skills of its students. The main reason for this situation is the wrong prioritization in the learning process. Teachers in China prepare their students for English exams, that they can successfully pass with the method of memorization the right words and understanding grammar rules. However, due to that there is not enough attention to the main complexity of Chinese students in learning English — the correct pronunciation. For Chinese students there is no need to speak English, or to understand spoken language, because it is not required in the system of English exams in secondary and primary school. In Chinese universities, each student must take the test of English as a foreign language for graduation from high school. They must also pass CET4 or CET6 (College English Test). This test consists of short written tasks, vocabulary tests and interpretation. However, in practice it turns out that students who have successfully passed the exam do not have sufficient skills to maintain a dialogue with the teacher. Summing up the results of learning English by Chinese students, I can say that in General they have a good base of English, but without proper adjustment of knowledge they are unlikely to be able to effectively use their knowledge base in a real dialogue with a native English speaker.