Many families have expressed to me the desire to identify more resources for their children to learn/explore Chinese language outside of the classroom. Tonight Sanaa enjoyed watching the new Mandarin language Sesame Street. There were a lot of words that she was not able to identify but she was completely engaged and enjoyed watching the You Tube videos. I strongly recommend this series as an opportunity for families to supplement their child’s language learning.
I recently returned from what has been an absolutely amazing experience. I, along with more than 400 school administrators and educators, participated in the 2012 Chinese Bridge Delegation. This event is hosted by the Hanban (Chinese Ministry of Education) and CollegeBoard. The Delegates were separated into 10 groups and traveled to various provinces throughout China.
I was paired with a group of approximately 45 Principals, Superintendents, District Representatives and two Stanford representatives – all from the state of California. They were an incredible group and it was an honor to have been linked with such a great group of committed and hard working school administrators.
Two of the administrators in our group presently oversee Mandarin Immersion school programs. Mr. Edward Park is the Principal of Barnard Elementary School in San Diego, CA. Mr. Parks consistently represented himself as a true advocate for his students. While there was a lot of very thoughtful conversation about the importance and the sometimes misguided influence of test scores, Mr. Parks is an administrator that has ushered a significant amount of change in his school over the last five years. According to Movoto School Rankings, the API scores at Barnard have increased almost 100 points with students achieving an average score of 838. Barnard is a Title I school with an incredibly diverse student body that is approximately 40% Latino, 20% African American and 30% White. I challenge others to help me find a Chinese Immersion program that is primarily Latino / African American. What I have seen more often are Chinese Immersion programs with large General Education programs with a large African American / Latino population. We will continue to highlight tremendous things as Mr. Park and Barnard continue to excel in their program.
Mr. Peter Moore is the Head of the Lower School at the Chinese American International School (CAIS) located in San Francisco, CA. According to the Mandarin Immersion Parents Council, CAIS is the oldest Mandarin Immersion school in the United States, a private K-8 founded in 1981. The second U.S. Mandarin Immersion is Potomac Elementary School in Potomac, Maryland, that was founded in 1986. Mr. Moore is entering his second year as the Lower School Director at CAIS. Prior to that he has taught second, fourth, fifth and sixth grade, as well as, technology to kinder through sixth grade. Mr. Moore brings a high level of excitement, passion and commitment to providing his students with consistency across the curriculum as well as a stimulating classroom environment. (As a disclaimer I have to add that I was first impressed with Mr. Moore when we toured CAIS prior to enrolling our children. From our first meeting he has impressed me with his commitment to provide his students with the best opportunities to reach their full potential. His desire to support students and faculty is one of the many reasons we selected CAIS for our children.)
Two of the schools present at the Delegation currently provide supplemental Chinese language programs – Windmere Ranch Middle School in the San Ramon Valley Unified School District and Killian Elementary School in the Rowland Unified School District. We intend to highlight more from the Chinese Bridge Delegation in later posts.
My five year old is attempting to master her whisper primarily to issue orders to her younger sister. Interestingly, the younger one enjoys it. She inches closer and closer trying to hear the details of the obscured and hushed orders. When she makes out the details of the mischievous exchange her excitement peaks. Watching this I know that their mastery of Chinese will only make this exchange of secrets, codes, and hidden meanings even easier and more exciting for them as they grow older.
Luckily, my recent interest in phone applications has opened a whole world to me. Opportunities to learn Chinese make themselves available during my morning drive, trips to the gym, waiting at the DMV, etc. It’s been easy, accessible and fun.
Here are my favorite applications:
Chinese Pod: an online service that provides Internet lessons that can be downloaded to your iAnything. The lessons range from newbie to advanced, so both you and your children can learn. I love these lessons as the instructors are upbeat, engaged and very easy to understand. They add in cultural references to teach real vs. text book Chinese which I definitely appreciate. I use the free version (Families enrolled at Yu Ming Charter School have an additional discount that makes this a great offer).
Chinese Flashcards: a well organized education package to maximize your results, progress and joy in learning Mandarin Chinese by means of the attractive and interactive interface of flashcard display that shows you useful Chinese words card by card to help your memorization. I love the flash cards. It helps me to learn some of the basic greetings and commonly used Chinese words while familiarizing myself with the character. Very easy to use which makes it a fun and quick go to when I have a few free minutes.
Flash Match Chinese I: a highly customizable matching game ( memory game ) and flashcards presentation tool. It doesn’t inundate you with all the varied and subtle meanings of words. That’s the domain of a good text book and teacher. The words selected here have a clear meaning that can be printed in the space of a one centimeter tile. This is one of my favorites. I really enjoy the matching game. Playing the matching game helps me realize how much I am picking up from the girls. I actually have a larger vocabulary than I realize and find this game super fun.
Learn Chinese Lite: an easy to use mobile Chinese phrasebook that will give visitors to Chinese-speaking countries and those who are interested in learning Mandarin a good start in the language. I think this app will be most helpful for traveling but it’s a very easy to use application with words and phrases presented on an attractive and easy to use platform.
Pinyin Lite: helps you master those tones with Pinyin, the standard romanization system for Mandarin Chinese. With 1,000 individual sound recordings made by a native Chinese speaker and a variety of question-and-answer methods, it’ll keep you on your toes and improve your Chinese listening skills like nothing else. I love this app because I still have no clue how to distinguish tones and sounds. Just playing with this app and guessing is fun because it’s helping me to become a better listener in Chinese so hopefully I’ll know the difference between cat, horse, mother, etc.
Bonus Recommendation:
Remembr.it: teaches you Chinese characters based on an optimized learning sequence that actually makes them easy to learn. First you’ll learn basic components then you’ll learn characters based on their phonetic series to help see the logic behind the characters and means you can easily remember whole groups of characters. Not everyone cares about learning to read Chinese but if you are interested in learning characters this is another great site. I love the drills that they offer to help commit the words to memory. It’s not available via app but it’s a great website.
Is it necessary for me to learn Chinese?
No. It is in no way necessary for monolingual parents to learn Chinese in order for their children to thrive or succeed in bilingual programs. It is also not necessary to learn Chinese to help your children with their homework. I will never be as fluent as my children and that is not my intent. I just want to know a little bit so that I can understand some of their whispers.
Have you made any attempts to learn Chinese? Please comment on your journey and any sites or apps that have helped you learn.
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