Research projects

1. I co-authored an intermediate level Chinese textbook dedicated to Ondoku (reading aloud) practice .2. I conducted five pronunciation sessions in four years (2018-2022), and recorded change in learners’ pronunciation.3. Together with a collaborator, I did a survey on the current status of Chinese language education in the Sanin region in Japan (Shimane and Tottori prefectures).4. I conducted a series of investigations on challenges in light tones experienced by Japanese learners when they practice reading aloud.5. I developed a "Pronunciation Guiding System" using Filemaker (Claris platform) and created the "Pronunciation Errors Database (light tones)".6. I proposed an index to evaluate students' pronunciation competence: Pronunciation Competence Rating. This index was used to observe the features of changes in learners' pronunciation competence.7. A Chinese phonics teaching resource website using Notion platform (Ding's pronunciation teaching and research workshop)

We started to involve students in developing materials for a mobile English learning project in 2013. In the first stage, students were paid to write short essays, make grammar and vocabulary quizzes, and create learning animations. In the second stage, we called for volunteer contributions from subscribers in the hope of sustaining a project by the students and for the students. The data collected highlighted several areas 1) Mobile learning materials are usually short and focused, making them suitable for development even by students. 2) The content developed by students is perceived to be as readable by their peer users as teacher-generated materials. 3) Without proper instruction and training, students tend to contribute e-learning content that needs substantial editing by teachers. 4) Even with an offer of payment, few students are motivated to contribute content. How to sustain student participation in content development is found to be a major challenge in the project.