China On Their Minds Language

China on their minds
Language, culture classes become more common in schools

(Does your school system offer Chinese? If not, please contact the Chinese Language School of Connecticut, www.ChineseLanguageSchool.org for information on how to introduce Chinese language and culture to your children.)

As the world shrinks and China continues to grow as an economic powerhouse, more area public school districts are embracing its language and culture in an effort to better prepare their students.

Last fall, Medfield High School freshman Katrina Simon and her family hosted an exchange student from China, immersing the young woman in American experiences ranging from apple picking to shopping at the Apple computer store.

Now, Simon hopes Melody — the student’s adopted American name — can return the favor and be her guide in China.

“After talking to her and learning more about Chinese culture, I thought it was really interesting,’’ Simon said. “I really wanted to go and see it for myself with my own eyes.’’

Medfield’s school district has partnered with a school in Bengbu, a city in China’s Anhui province, for an extensive exchange program. Medfield hosted the school’s principal two years ago, followed by a visit to China by Superintendent Robert Maguire.

The next step was an exchange of teachers, with two from Bengbu visiting Medfield while a local teacher spent six weeks at the school in China.

Most recently, Medfield hosted two teachers and 10 students, including Melody. Next fall, Medfield will send students to Bengbu, and Simon has applied to be among them.

Melody’s family has already agreed to host Simon if she is selected. “She was thrilled that I wanted to come,’’ Simon said.

All of the trips are paid for with grants and private funds, Maguire said.

Medfield started teaching Mandarin in its high school three years ago, and expanded course offerings into the middle school this year. Educators say a growing number of schools are offering the language, with the local list including Belmont, Brookline, Concord-Carlisle Regional, Dover-Sherborn, Hopkinton, Lexington, Marlborough, Needham, Newton, and Weston.

“Most of them, 80 or 90 percent, they added it in the past five or 10 years,’’ said Wanli Hu, director of the China Program Center at the University of Massachusetts Boston, which offers conferences for Chinese language teachers.

Maguire said the Chinese language instruction is helping to prepare students for an increasingly global workplace.

“We’re in a different world,’’ he said. “Making students aware of the rest of the world, having them become cognizant of other languages and cultures, is going to be critical in the future.’’

Medfield is one of 60 districts across the country given Confucius Classroom status by the Asia Society, in recognition of exemplary Chinese language and culture programs. The honor has brought at least $30,000 in grants into the district, with the possibility of more to come.

Simon traveled to Washington, D.C., earlier this year for an event focused on school exchange programs, where she met the president’s wife, Michelle Obama, and Medfield’s school district contributed to the official state gift given to the president of China, Hu Jintao, during his visit to the United States.

Simon said she was surprised to learn how much more Melody knew about American society than she knows about other cultures. Simon was unable to name any Chinese music artists, while Melody was “totally obsessed’’ with Michael Jackson.


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And when she asked Melody, a talented singer and dancer, to perform, Simon said, “We thought she would sing a traditional Chinese song, and she sang the ‘Titanic’ song.’’

Medfield social studies teacher Richard DeSorgher, who spent six weeks in Bengbu, said the differences between the two systems are stark. He said students in China spend long hours at school, and extra time being tutored on nights and weekends for college entrance exams. Class sizes of up to 60 students mean rote learning is common, he said.

DeSorgher said he asked a Chinese-born student living in Medfield for advice before the trip. “He said, ‘Make it fun. The more you can make it fun, the more they’ll want to continue to learn English.’ So I went over there armed with a ton of American candy.

“I think I was kind of an oddity there,’’ DeSorgher added. “I put them in groups, I had them standing and sitting. It was just very different, I think.’’

Medfield’s burgeoning relationship with the Chinese language started when Spanish teacher Maura Batts took a one-year sabbatical to learn a new language.

“I was deciding between Chinese and Italian,’’ Batts said. “My heart wanted Italian, but Chinese is so up and coming, and I thought it would kind of rock my language world a little bit, because it’s so different.’’

Students are signing up for Chinese instead of French or Spanish for a variety of reasons, she said.

“One boy in the seventh-grade class was really into kung fu, and he just really loves watching Jackie Chan movies,’’ Batts said. “Other parents have told their children, ‘This is a new opportunity, it would be great for you to try this.’ A lot of those parents understand the global perspective.’’

DeSorgher said that, in addition to being potentially useful to students later in life, the Chinese exchange exposes them to diversity, something he said the district otherwise lacks.

“With this exchange, it brings in a different culture, a different language, different thought patterns,’’ DeSorgher said.

Maguire, who adopted the Chinese name Ma Bao Bo when he visited Bengbu, said he hopes his district will eventually be able to offer a full slate of Chinese classes, from middle school through high school.

The superintendent said the Chinese program is helping Medfield students make important personal connections across continents.

He told a story of sixth-graders participating in a video conference with their Chinese pen pals. One of the Chinese students became especially excited seeing her American counterpart, Maguire said.

“The Chinese kid looks at the American girl and says, ‘You are so beautiful.’ And she looked back and said, ‘You’re beautiful too,’ ’’ Maguire said. “And they’re doing this in front of 100 other sixth-graders.

“That’s been a very powerful piece for me. They’re getting a fundamental understanding that, as people, they’re not much different from each other.’’