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For students whose first language ( L l ) employs an alphabetic writing system, learning to read Chinese is especially challenging due to the nonalphabetic nature of its orthography. Because Chinese characters represent the spoken language in a largely irregular and unsystematic manner, it is important to establish the extent to which beginning Chinese language learners rely upon their developing spoken language resources when identifying Chinese word meanings. To investigate this relationship between speech and meaning, a word recognition study was conducted whereby 20 beginning learners of Chinese as a Foreign Language (CFL) were required to pronounce and later identify in English 46 Chinese words. The correlational analysis indicated a significant relationship between being able to pronounce and being able to identify Chinese words. Implications for theory building and pedagogical application are discussed.OF THE MANY TASKS FACING THE BEGINning learner of Chinese as a Foreign Language (CFL), perhaps none is more daunting than learning the Chinese writing system. Students initially may seem excited at the prospect of learning to read Chinese because of the innate aesthetic appeal of the written Chinese character, yet it is not long before they realize that learning Chinese characters in a systematic manner over the long term is a labor-intensive endeavor, and one that places huge demands on their memories, time, and study capabilities. Although teachers of Chinese do their best to facilitate their students' progress by honoring age-old traditional methods of pedagogical practice that have been used in the first language (Ll) setting, the reality is that researchers have only recently begun to in-The Modern Language Journal, 82, ii, (1998) 01998 The Modern Language Journal 0026-7902/98/194-204 $1.50/0 vestigate empirically the processes involved when CFL students learn Chinese characters (Everson, 1993;Ke, 1996;McGinnis, 1995). This article will extend this area of research by focusing its investigation upon word recognition, defined here as deriving both the phonetic codes (or pronunciation) as well as lexical meaning from printed Chinese characters. The article will discuss theories of word recognition, paying special attention to how different orthographies represent the phonological features of the spoken language. Most important, it will present the findings of a study conducted with beginning CFL learners that suggest a strong relationship between the abilities of pronouncing Chinese words and identifying their meanings. Implications for CFL reading instruction will then be discussed, with an appeal for the development of a systematic CFL reading theory and accompanying pedagogy that take into account not only the unique features of the Chinese language, but reading universals as well. BACKGROUND 195 exert efforts to become more "mainstream" in American educational settings, research that focuses on how learners deal with different orthographic systems will be of critical importance (Koda, 1994).First l...

The past few decades have witnessed a growing interest in how second language (L2) learners come to read in languages employing non-alphabetic writing systems such as Chinese and Japanese and languages employing non-Roman alphabetic systems such as Arabic and Hebrew. Indeed, with efforts afoot to begin more programs in these languages at the K-12 and collegiate levels, in immersion and bilingual settings, and with stated goals for students to eventually attain high levels in reading proficiency, an understanding of this research is critical if program development is to go forward in a principled way. This article discusses some of the theoretical developments that have helped illuminate the cross-orthographic reading process and reports on the relevant research in L2 cross-orthographic reading that has shaped our understanding of the issues involved in learning to read in languages that employ non-Roman alphabetic, logographic, and syllabary systems of writing. The article will also discuss teaching implications, strategies, and classroom practice put forth by reading practitioners, many of which have yet to find consensus.

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