mandarin chinese lessons at goodrich school

[mynamehere]

The Chinese teacher who has been teaching my son privately for the last 6 years has asked if I think parents would like to be offered classes for their primary children at Goodrich after school. This teacher and her colleague are young highly trained native speakers. Their lessons are top modern fun standard. And, if your child keeps it up, in Year 11 they can take the Chinese GCSE and have that important "edge" that might make all the difference. Chinese is going to be the world language with English of course in the future.

This "thread" is a test of the waters: What do you think? Would you be willing to have your child take Chinese after school at Goodrich for a few ?'s?

Would you like classes for yourself? For an older, Secondary aged child?

Give it a think and post here!

[spotify]

The BBC had a number of lessons on radio4 many years ago which I thought was an excellent idea,

until I discovered there were about 20 different ways of pronouncing the word 'OW'

and they all meant something different.

I was convinced from that day forth, I am no linguist.

[mynamehere]

But your son or daughter...... must everyone speak English? It puts us at a disadvantage in business: "they" can talk about us and we cannot understand.

[MrsP]

Ni hao! Yes, I think this is a great idea. I seem to recall that there is already some Mandarin teaching going on at Goodrich but might be mistaken. I learnt Mandarin at university and lived in China for some time. Contrary to what many believe it is not difficult to learn containing virtually no grammar and is based on much simpler principles than any european language. Not sure how proficient GCSE Mandarin is, my memories of GCSE French are patchy but we got as far as learning how to ask for directions to the Gare du Nord. However, I do think that language learning is important and would support any local mandarin classes for children or adults. China is a world player and having an increasingly important role to play in such affairs, it is crucial that we have young people able to understand Mandarin and Chinese culture if we are to engage in a meaningful way. Anyone offering conversational Chinese for adults - I need to practise!

[bizzylizzy]

Children can choose Mandarin lessons at Charter

[Pickle]

An excellent idea, and one which I would support. My son is at Goodrich nursery and says "ni hao" at every opportunity after the China studies they did a few weeks ago - a good start!

[mynamehere]

After 3 replies this dropped off everyone's radar. For interest alone I note that parents drive what children learn as England is currently run. For anyone reading this last note run your eye along what people want to talk about: new babies, cute babies, aches and pains, baby milestones, little babies. Babies are easy and fun. Instilling a love of learning and accepting family responsibility for how children learn is harder. As parents we demand learning from teachers like a commodity and when kids fall short it someone else's fault.

But in the end, or at the beginning, learning is what we ask our children to do and what we expect from them at home not only at school: Memorise your ABC's, Want to read and learn the basics, Times Tables to 12 by 12 memorised and always always ask questions and think and take responsibility for your own leaning and actions.

Schools will not teach Chinese unless parents ask. It is not that hard for a child to learn. NO GRAMMAR and the writing is pictures.

Just my opinion.

[BeccaL]

Mynamehere - not sure what you are getting at? The pupils at Goodrich have Chinese lessons in yr 5 and 6, so I'm sure the school would be interested in this. Why doesn't your teacher contact the school directly - they have an after school club coordinator who could talk to her about this.

[DaveR]

The current obssession with teaching kids Chinese seems a little odd to me. Learning to speak basic Chinese phonetically may not be that hard, but learning to read/write Chinese to any kind of level is a pretty mammoth task.

Also, the rise of Chinese economic power has no correlation with a rise in the use of Chinese as a world language. The German economy is pretty strong but German businesses (like all other businesses the world over) regard English as the primary global language. I read recently that over 30% of science research papers from internationally recognised institutions are now published only in English, i.e. many scientists now decide not to bother publishing their research in their native language.

To anser the OP's question, I'm more interested in teaching my kids European languages, tbh.

[candj]

I have to agree with DaveR. Learning French or Spanish must certainly be more useful when living in Europe than learning Mandarin. The only reason there is such a big push is that currently not many Mainland Chinese speak English, but this will very soon change and I dare say the Chinese are probably learning English faster than the world is learning Mandarin.

I am being hypocritical of course as my children take weekly mandarin lessons but they're part Chinese, we used to live in china, I myself speak mandarin fluently and we're moving back to Asia, but aside from personal reasons or reasons because you want to learn another language don't see why schools here should make it mandatory. And if it's already offered in yr 5/6 at Goodrich then that's great.

[Rachel Esme]

I am in Year 11 at Haberdasher Aske's Hatcham College and study GCSE Mandarin. I have almost completed the the GCSE and have achieved A*s in my speaking and writing exams, I am yet to take my reading and writing exams but my school have predicted me an A* overall. I'm going to continue Higher Level Chinese at Dartford Grammar School out of pure interest.

If you're a linguist, or polyglot should I say then even the reading and writing won't be too difficult. I grew up speaking Yoruba a language that shares the same phonology and SVP syntax as Mandarin so I haven't found Mandarin speaking difficult at all. I'm an avid learner or languages so I choose to adapt to the writing style with ease but I do agree that for children in the primary phase a language like Mandarin shouldn't be mandatory. Not all of them will be lucky enough to speak a similar language already like I did it's almost pointless. I went to China for the entire summer last year and the city folk insist on speaking 'my language' English to me -_- I can't even speak Mandarin in restaurants down here they're all Cantonese.

Learning a European language like Spanish has been far more rewarding and useful for me but I still love Mandarin it's a very beautiful and culturally rich language.

*Rant over*

[Link]

Rachel, bawo ni? Inu mi dun lati ka pe o gbo Yoruba! Emi naa a gbiyanju lati ko awon omo ni ede daadaa nitori ojo ola. O digba kan na. E ki ile.

[minder]

My Year 7 daughter is learning Mandarin at The Charter. She seems to enjoy it but I will see how it goes.

[stepnica]

hai you ren xiang yao lianxi zhongwen ma ?? qing he wo lianxi.

(anyone else wants to practice mandarin? please contact me. i am a native speaker and went to uni in beijing 1999-2003)

:)