Teachers’ Workshops

by achen1818

Teachers' Workshops

CTS workshop 1
Screenshot (192)
Zoom teaching 2
BY 3
BY 9

I have given dozens of workshops for teachers at conferences and on university campuses in the U.S. (including about 40 states), China, and Canada. The workshop sizes vary, and can reach up to 300 participants.

What is "Teaching Chinese through Song"?

My main workshop topic is “Teaching Chinese through Song.” This workshop introduces the groundbreaking approach of teaching Chinese using a musical, vocal approach. In this workshop, participants - primarily Chinese language teachers - go through a step-by-step learning progression to obtain the basics of vocal techniques and teaching methods. They walk away with the confidence and skills to improve their students’ pronunciation, diction, voice projection and language expression through singing. A few thousand teachers have participated in this workshop, and many of them praised it as “the most useful and fun workshop I have ever attended.” I have attached teachers’ evaluations below, which show that the average satisfaction level of over 300 teachers is 99.5%.

张泓教授复旦大学海报

In addition to “Teaching Chinese through Song,” my workshop topics also include:

Teaching English through Song

Language Learning through Song

Diction for Singing Western Songs

Voice Care through Singing

Voice Training for Speakers

Voice Technique and Body Language for Language Teachers
Hong Zhang is a wonderful presenter. The concert singing is + + + + +!! She is a vibrant speaker, expressive and knowledgeable. ---- Delightful, excellent, and educational.

Rosemarie Snyder

LYCIUM class, Binghamton University
… thank you for your excellent presentation and wonderful performance on July 5 of the NEH summer institute… Your afternoon presentation was informative and engaging and provided a valuable overview of traditional and contemporary Chinese music. Your explanation of some of the traditions of various ethnic nationalities in China in the context of their music also was useful for the teachers.

Bruce Acker

NEH Summer Institute Coordinator, University at Buffalo
I enjoyed Professor Zhang’s lecture soooo much! Too bad that it has only one and a half hours. Let’s cancel the lunch time and continue to learn!

A Participant of the Beijing Language and Culture University Teachers Workshop

Very interesting and practical—we can apply this approach to our teaching immediately. These techniques are also very helpful for teachers to improve our way of speaking.

A Participant of the Beijing Language and Culture University Teachers Workshop

I just wanted to take a moment to thank you so much for the pre-conference workshop that you did at last week's National Chinese Language Conference. I'm not sure if you will recall meeting me, but my name is Ashley Ferranti and I'm the Chinese teacher at Cheshire Academy. I wanted to let you know that I was truly inspired by your workshop and my class has begun to work on阿里山之歌! I'm not very good on the piano so one of my students played it and recorded it for us.

Ashley Ferranti

Cheshire Academy
Professor Zhang is very conscientious, full of energy and enthusiasm. She has well interpreted that teaching is not merely a job but a life-long career!

A Participant of the Beijing Language and Culture University Teachers

I wanted to express my thanks for your thoughtful presentation on Chinese musical traditions at the University at Buffalo’s China camp a few weeks ago. It was a wonderful experience that has left me feeling so enriched with information. I came to the institute looking for more creative ways to teach about China, and your beautiful presentations have already given me so many ideas! I teach at a predominantly Hmong school, and there are many similarities to the types of music/dance traditions I observe among my students. I look forward to engaging with them on these points, as I’m sure they would love the opportunity to teach the teacher a thing or two! Again, many thanks.

Alexis May

Johnson High School, St. Paul, MN