Effect of Using ChineseSkill on the Learning Achievement of Chinese as a Second Language Beginners

Abstract

Since overseas Chinese as a second language (CSL) learning encounters huge challenges, ChineseSkills, a Chinese language app, was adopted in this study aiming to improve the achievement of CSL beginners. It was a quasi-experimental study that lasted approximately 10 weeks. Data were collected at a college in Malaysia using a purposive sampling method.  The experimental and control groups consisted of 105 and 63 participants respectively. One-way ANOVA, independent samples t-test, and paired sample t-test were used to analyze the data. The insignificant difference between the experimental and control groups in the pretest indicated that the participants in the two groups had similar levels of Chinese proficiency before the experiment. The experimental group scored significantly higher than the control group in the post-test, suggesting that teaching with ChineseSkills outperformed the conventional teaching method. Both the experimental and control groups scored significantly higher in the post-test than in the pretest. implying that both the conventional teaching method and teaching Chinese with ChineseSkills can enhance CSL learning. Therefore mobile apps such as ChineseSkills could be used to address challenges of overseas CSL learning, enhance learners' comprehensive CSL skills, and complement formal and informal language learning activities.