Trends and Contrasts of Attitudes toward Kanji Learning between Thai Learners of Japanese Language and Thai Teachers of Japanese Language

Abstract

Attitudes toward Kanji learning for Thai learners of Japanese language are full of variety. However, researches on attitudes for Thai teachers of Japanese language have scarcely been done. It is important to contrast the attitudes held by Thai learners and Thai teachers. Questionnaires were conducted based on 129 Thai learners majored in Japanese language and 35 Thai teachers in charge of Japanese language. Similarity and differences were shown by contrastive analysis with statistics. Results and discussion are described below.

1. For Thai teachers, the attitude toward Kanji learning is relatively more affirmative than Thai learners. When it comes to Kanji learning, Thai teachers are more likely than Thai learners to believe in the importance of Kanji learning with purpose and strong connections to Japanese culture.
2. For young Thai teachers, the attitude toward “significance of reading Kanji” is relatively more apparent than middle-aged and elderly Thai teachers. In other words, it suggests that middle-aged and elderly Thai teachers place importance on “significance of writing Kanji” more than young Thai teachers. This attitude may affect Thai learners’ Kanji acquisition.
3. For Thai learners, the attitude toward “avoidance behavior of using Kanji” is observed, when they are likely to make mistakes of writing.

Given the current situation that young Thai teachers are likely to focus on “reading Kanji”, active use of ICT could be desired in classroom activities for Kanji education.