Experts of Chinese language education suggested changing approaches to promote the language abroad at a seminar held in Beijing Monday, when about 40 million foreigners were studying this language worldwide.

"The promotion should shift from simple linguistic teaching to introducing the whole concept of Chinese language," said Xu Lin, general director of the Beijing-based Confucius Institute Headquarters. "That is to say, to give foreigners a general picture of what Chinese language is, rather than teach them some characters."

China should not wait for foreigners to come here to learn Chinese but go out to provide Chinese language courses abroad, she said.

The Confucius Institutes, funded by the Chinese government, are one of such efforts. Since 2004, a total of 249 institutes have been set up in 78 foreign countries.

Although about 3,500 universities now had Chinese language courses worldwide, most of them were provided for students and teachers in linguistic major, she said. "I hope more and more ordinary people will be included."

"The experience of establishing Confucius Institutes has given us full confidence that we could have cooperative and market-oriented working mechanism on Chinese language promotion with our foreign partners, either government-funded or non-governmental," she said.

Better digital technology and multi-media methods should be introduced in teaching, instead of the current paper-based methods, said Cui Xiliang, president of Beijing Language and Culture University, at the same seminar.

The Confucius Institutes have reached learners of 149 countries by radio or online.

Since 2004, China has helped foreign counterparts train more than 60,000 local teachers. At present, over 4,000 Chinese teachers and volunteers are working in 105 countries for Chinese language promotion. In addition, China has joined hands with the United States, Canada, Australia to set up normal education of Chinese teaching. But a shortage of teachers is still a problem, Xu said.

The three-day seminar, held once every three years for the ninth time, focused on "standard teaching to meet diversified needs" this year. Nearly 800 scholars from 26 countries attended the seminar.

(Xinhua News Agency December 16, 2008)