LinkChinese UK News

It’s a matter of “practise, practise, practise”. The Chronicle Herald, a local newspaper in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, reports the Mandarin lessons for the Grade 3 students at Sacred Heart School:

Like many young girls these days, Sarah Tai-MacArthur and Robin Short are yapping away on cellphones, talking about going to the mall.

But this isn’t your typical chat between preteens.

These two smart Grade 3 students are speaking Mandarin Chinese. The interactive lesson is part of a special after-school program at Sacred Heart School of Halifax.

With smiling instructor Ming-Ling Tsay always nearby to correct pronunciation or offer encouragement, a small group of students gather together once a week to learn the most spoken language in the world.

Full report

 

Chinese student Yu Huai Zhang’s inspirational story of his experiences at Queen’s University Belfast and in Northern Ireland has earned him the title of International Student of the Year 2007. Yu Huai, who is known as Neo to his fellow students, beat off stiff competition from more than 2000 students representing 130 nationalities, to win the title and the £2,000 prize.

The competition - the British Council annual Shine International Student Awards - highlights the unique contributions of international students to life in the United Kingdom. Neo, who comes from Shenzhen and who studies Management at Queen’s, had previously been named Northern Ireland’s International Student of the Year.

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UK schools are to import Mandarin teachers from China to assistant Mandarin-teaching in state schools. The Specialist Schools and Academies Trust (SSAT), an educational charity, which represents 90 per cent of England’s 2,950 state secondary schools, has signed an agreement with China’s Office of Chinese Language Council International (also known as Han Ban 汉办).

Under this scheme, schools will host two Chinese teaching assistants each, who will work in several schools. The teachers, funded and paid for by the schools and Han Ban, will be expected to stay for up to two years.

Sir Cyril Taylor, chairman of the SSAT, said it should be seen as the key language for future generations to learn - replacing European languages.

He told Parliament Education and Skills Committee: “I want all language colleges to be teaching Mandarin. It is a strategic world language. The difficulty in the past has been getting Chinese teachers. However, exchanges between our schools and Chinese schools will help to change that. We learn from them and they learn from us.”

According to The Times newspaper, about 60 Chinese Language Assistants were placed in English schools last year under this scheme. The number rises to 80 this year, and is expected to reach 100 by 2008.

The Times’s report: 100 teachers imported from China

The Independent’s report: Schools import China’s teachers for lessons in ‘language of tomorrow’.

 

Newcastle’s Evening Chronicle reports that some schools in the northeast England have started to give Mandarin lessons to their pupils. Some have organised or are preparing school trips to China. Hilary French, the headmistress of Central Newcastle High School, whose pupils are just back from a trip to Beijing, said GDST (The Girls’ Day School Trust, which Central High is part of) is planning to open two new schools in Shanghai.

Another school, Park View Community School, in Chester-le-Street, County Durham, has fromed a partnership with Suzhou High School near Shanghai. What’s more, young children at Bedewell Primary, in Hebburn, South Tyneside, having been learning Mandarin for the last two years, after the school formed a link with one in China.
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A local newspaper in London, Muswell Hill Journal

reports:

Children as young as three are taking up Mandarin at a Muswell Hill language school.

The Hua Hsia Chinese School, which first opened in Swiss Cottage, has now started classes in Muswell Hill as demand has exploded.

Katja Ting, originally from Taiwan, who runs the school, said: “China has become powerful and people want to trade with them. If you have that language on your CV you will get a job because not many people have it.

Read the full report.

 

A study by New Zealand’s Waikato University suggests Chinese students are generally satisfied with their education, but a big gap remains between students’ expection and the reality of life in New Zealand.

Radio New Zealand reports that the survey indicates that the reputation of New Zealand is recovering in China, after suffered bad publicity a few years ago. Almost half of the Chinese students want to live in Zealand permanently.

According to newspaper The Dominion Post, the number of fee-paying Chinese students in New Zealand has plummeted from the peak of 53,340 in 2002 after many incidents involving Chinese students, including one murder case. Since 2003, the New Zealand government has worked to rebuild the industry. In 2006 the number is 34,870 which is the lowest but there have been various signs of recovery.

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A local newspaper Hampstead and Highgate Express reports a delegation of secondary school pupils from North London has recently visited Shanghai and Yunnan to study Chinese culture and how Chinese do recycling, in a British Council-sponsored school trip to China.

Six pupils from William Ellis school of Camden, who are learning geography and Mandarin, visited schools and homes to see how Chinese live and the aspects of sustainablity. It is the second time students from William Ellis school, one of the few schools promoting Mandarin language learning in England, visited China.

Ben McPartland wrote on Hampstead and Highgate Express:

The language and geography students had a five-day stopover in Shanghai before visiting Yunman Nationalities Middle School in the Kunming province to look at the area’s attempts to be sustainable.

Year 10 pupil Kai Akinde-Hummel, who is studying Mandarin, said: “Visiting the Chinese home was the highlight of the trip. We had to eat some interesting food like chicken feet and dog tails. It was a bit different to what we have here but I ate it to be polite more than anything.”

His classmate and fellow mandarin student Jamie Strowjas said: “It was really different over there. Their lives are much more humble than ours. They don’t have as many electrical appliances and they don’t drive around in big cars all the time.”

Read the full report here.

William Ellis school web site.

Yun Nan Nationalities High School 云南民族中学.