1 Introduction
In the digital learning environments of the post-COVID-19 era, blended teaching has emerged as a prevailing trend. Recent discourse in the domain of foreign language education has introduced the concept of ’principled eclecticism,’ advocating for the integration of varied teaching methodologies, techniques, and strategies. This approach aims to tailor education to the diverse goals, needs, and situations of learners, thereby enhancing the flexibility and diversity of foreign language instruction. Such learner-centered and diversified teaching methods align not only with the contemporary model of hybrid teaching, necessitated by the post-COVID-19 pandemic era, but also resonate with the ancient Chinese educational philosophy of ’teaching in accordance with aptitude’ (因材施教), as advocated by Confucius.
A comprehensive review of the pertinent literature indicates that the term ’principled eclecticism’ was first proposed in the early 2000s (Larsen-Freeman & Anderson, 2011; Mellow, 2000, 2002) and has since been predominantly discussed within the context of English language teaching. Yan, et al. (2007) discovered that 81.3% of English language educators at Chinese universities endorse the principled eclecticism approach. Interviews conducted as part of their research further elucidated that principled eclecticism significantly benefits students’ English language learning, particularly in enhancing vocabulary, listening, and reading skills. Valledor et al. (2023) substantiated that diverse teaching methods exert both similar and distinct impacts on learners’ acquisition of English, with communicative language teaching, the audio-lingual method, and task-based language teaching enhancing communication skills; content and language integrated learning facilitating the absorption of English content knowledge; and whole language teaching improving learners’ proficiency in contextual English usage. However, Rakrak (2022) cautions against the indiscriminate combination of teaching approaches without a theoretical or research-based foundation, as it may negatively affect students’ writing skills.
Utilizing Boolean Logic, this study conducted a comprehensive search across major academic research databases—including Taiwan’s online Airiti Library, ERICDATA, the National Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations in Taiwan, the China Academic Journals Full-text Database (CJFD), the China Masters’ Theses Full-text Database (CMFD), the China Dissertations Database, EBSCOhost, ProQuest, and the Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)—to investigate the application of principled eclecticism in Chinese language teaching. The search revealed a notable paucity of discussion on this subject. Hence, this study endeavors to bridge the knowledge gap in Chinese language teaching research and practice by conducting a systematic literature review on the core concepts of principled eclecticism in foreign language education. Furthermore, it develops a lesson plan example for Chinese language teaching, along with a checklist for principled eclectic Chinese language teaching, intended for application in future research and practice.