CLSC Programs at Georgetown Community Center

Program to familiarize kids with Mandarin Chinese
Posted on 07/28/2010

From the Wilton Villager: http://www.wiltonvillager.com/story/489558

By DANIELLE CAPALBO

Villager Staff Writer


WILTON -- You're never too young to learn something new.

That's the prevailing philosophy behind a growing program designed to familiarize pre-school children with Mandarin Chinese through play and cultural activities.

Called Chopstix, the program is offered by the Chinese Language School of Connecticut and, this fall, the Greenwich-based institute will be hosting two free classes at the Georgetown Community Center.

"It's a different way to learn," said Susan Serven, the mother of two adopted Chinese girls and a co-founder and president of the school.

Rather than teaching the language outright -- the way a student might learn French in school, for instance -- instructors at Chopstix guide children through games and art projects while speaking Mandarin Chinese almost exclusively. Eventually, the pint-size pupils respond to -- and replicate -- the commands, as if it were second nature.

"We want them to feel comfortable, and we use a play-based model because that's how most kids are able to learn the best," said Katy Myers, who was born in Taipei, Taiwan, and moved to the states as a pre-teen. "For the most part, they really don't even know they're learning -- they think they're playing a game."

Myers has been teaching at the Chinese Language School for seven years -- she's the director of arts and culture -- and will guide the demonstration classes.

The school itself was founded in 2002 by a group of area parents, including Serven, inspired to promote awareness of Chinese culture and to give children and adults of all backgrounds an opportunity to learn the most widely-spoken language in the world, Serven said.

"About 23 percent of the world speaks Mandarin Chinese as a first language," she said. "Not only people in China and Taiwan, but in Malaysia, Singapore, the Phillipines."

Chopstix was integrated into the school's curriculum a year later, adapted from a nonprofit program that Serven ran in the late-90s. She said the importance of teaching the language at a ripe age is manifold. For one thing, she said, younger children are more likely to retain the structure of the language and to retain it longer, making it easier to revisit as teenagers or adults.

There's an element of global practicality, too, she said.

"Most parents, especially in this area, recognize China's growing emergence in the global economy," she said. "Many business people in Shanghai, Hong Kong -- they speak English, but it's important to understand their culture and their language moving forward."

Myers said the program represents a possibility that hasn't always existed for second-generation immigrants or Chinese children adopted into English-speaking families: to learn the language of their heritage.

"I realized that, growing up, there were no places for Chinese children to get together, for families to get together, and celebrate their heritage," she said -- in part because immigrants spoke different dialects and couldn't easily create communities or schools."

It's also a way to create a cross-cultural community of Asians and Americans, she said.

"Hopefully we can create an Asian-American community -- a way to foster more understanding of our different cultures."

Chopstix classes will be held at the Georgetown Community Center, formerly the Gilbert and Bennett School, at 49 New Street, Wilton. Demo classes will be held on Aug. 28 and Sept. 4: ages 2 to 3, from 10 to 10:45 a.m.; and ages 4 to 5, from 11 to 11:45 a.m. For further information, visit www.chineselanguageschool.org/.