INTEGRATED CHINESE
My Take
I've used IC both in college and high school settings for 20 years. Here, as I see it, are the pros and cons:
Pros:
- Widely used in universities, so if your high school students continue to take Chinese in college, they will probably be using this, so will be continuing their studies with text materials they are already comfortable with.
- Systematic, easy-to-use format, with dialogues, vocabulary, grammar and usage sections all clearly arranged.
- Thematically arranged material; student progress is gauged according to what students should be able to do, rather than patterns and grammar points. Nevertheless, there is still detailed grammar and usage information.
- seeks to be 'relevant' by placing dialogues in a generic western university setting (this is also a 'con': see below). This is true of the first two volumes (Level 1). In Level Two (vol. 3) there is a trip to China. Most of the situations and language usage are also applicable to high school students.
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Cons:
- 'Relevance.' The decision here was made to set much of the book in a non-Chinese setting. There are good reasons for this. Students in a western setting may be more readily able to apply language to their everyday situations, where they will actually be doing most of their language practice. However, there is, in my view, a price. Language will be less culturally-embedded, even less Chinese in some ways (for an alternative to this approach, see the review of New Practical Chinese Reader).
- Mistakes and typos. IC always has a fair number of typos and errors in all editions. It seems that Cheng & Tsui is not that into proofing their texts before publication. Not a major drawback, just annoying.
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Bottom Line:
Integrated Chinese is an excellent set of materials for high school students that will definitely cover three to four years of fairly rigorous instruction. In a typical (non-'ABC') high school class, you will probably not be able to finish all materials in three years (maybe not even four). And when your students go to college they will probably thank you for introducing them to the same materials they will be using in that setting.
However, for the 'cultural' reasons mentioned above, I am experimenting this year with using New Practical Chinese Reader (4th edition). I'll continue to update.
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