The Confucius Institute In Jamaica Calligraphy Teaching And Research

With the great development of Confucius Institutes all over the world, the writer hadtaken part in Chinese Voluntary Teaching Program organized by Han ban to teach Chinesein the University of West Indians (Jamaica) between September,2011to July,2012.Duringthis period, the writer took part in many cultural activities and found that many foreignersshowed great interest in Chinese calligraphy. In this case, the writer gave some calligraphydemonstrations on calligraphy, which got a successful feedback and finally madecalligraphy class as a normal class in Confucius Institute.This paper summarizes the methods and strategies of teaching Chinese calligraphy onthe basis of analyzing the practical condition of C.I. in UWI (Jamaica) and thecharacteristic of Chinese characters. Meanwhile, the writer made a fundamental teachingpractice and design based on the experience of learning and teaching situation aboutChinese calligraphy in C.I. in the UWI (Jamaica). On the basis of exploring the personalityand similarity between Chinese characters and calligraphy, the writer proposed someprinciples for calligraphy teaching: pen first and then brush; adjust measures to localconditions and to teach students in accordance of there aptitude; step by step, happy is themost important policy. The whole process must highlight the different key teaching pointsin accordance of the stages. In order to make a successful teaching, the writer made astandard scheme of selecting the right characters and also designed five steps for a standardclass: lead-in; content expansion; imitation; cultural features lead-in; to call an ending. Dueto the features we found among the students, the writer hopes to improve the interest andstudy of the students and their Chinese level.Through the research, the writer thinks that the try of integrating calligraphy teachingwith the teaching of Chinese characters can improve learning inefficiency of Chinesecharacters. The teacher can also help the students to develop a good habit of learningChinese characters through some vivid teaching methods. It will be a good way to combinethe calligraphy teaching with the teaching of Chinese characters together, so the studentscan learn the traditional Chinese art and Chinese characters.