This project will invite TCLP alumni teachers from top high schools across China to Ms. Wang’s home city of Liuyang to give professional teaching lectures and display a demonstration class to 57 English teachers in Ms. Wang’s home school and 81 members of Ms. Wang's English workshop.
The students are going to be pen pals between my host school in Chicago, Illinois and my home school in China. In order to experience Chinese culture, the students who participate in the pen pal activity in America are going to Chinatown in downtown Chicago in May as a field trip. The students will taste Chinese food in a Chinese restaurant, they will be able to apply their ability to use chopsticks. They will also look at the architecture there, they will take the activities we did.
All 472 students in Batesville Intermediate School participated in introductory Chinese calligraphy classes during the school day and 41 students signed up to participate in after school calligraphy clubs to learn even more. This all took place as part of my TCLP outreach.
The EMMS Chinese Class Yearbook 2021-2022 is an artistic presentation of all the activities, what we've learned throughout the year, as well as students' own understanding of things related to the language and cultural learning. This is not only a collection of memories, but also an achievement exhibition. Students in the Chinese class and Chinese enrichment class will all work together toward the final production of the Yearbook. Additionally, the outreach activities to the whole school and community will be included in the yearbook.
The project will consist of two parts. First, before the festival, students will learn about the tradition of Spring Festival and how Chinese people celebrate it. They will make crafts in preparation of the festival, like papercutting, lanterns, and couplets, to decorate the classroom and a Chinese culture bulletin board. They will also learn about Chinese food and practice how to use chopsticks. Then on Chinese New Year, the students and parents will take a field trip by bus to the Chinatown in downtown Chicago.
Cai Qi's home school and host schools were willing to establish a long-lasting sister-school relationship. Therefore, they decided to do a series of activities to help students and teachers in both schools understand and learn from each other better. First, they arranged a culture box activity to help groups of students and teachers to get to know each other and learn the culture and practice target language from each other. Second, they paired students and teachers in the U.S. with students and teachers from China to help them establish long-lasting communication.
Sister School Virtual Bilingual Video Class aims to bridge the geographical distance between two sister schools and create a platform beyond classrooms for students on both sides to improve their target languages, their cultural awareness, and their cross-cultural communication abilities. The virtual bilingual video class meets the needs of both Liuyang No.1 High school, which lacks native English teachers this year, and Chariho Regional High School where students of Mandarin classes can't have Chinese field trips beyond classroom during this special year.
Wang Ling received a CLP grant to build a sister school relationship between her host school in Rhode Island, Chariho Regional High School, and her home school in China, No.1 High School of Liuyang. The main goals of the project were to coordinate regular virtual exchanges for students at both schools, offer professional development opportunities for teachers in the U.S. and China to share best practices, establish exchange programs for Chinese students to study at Chariho Regional High School as international students and for U.S.
Kong Yanli received a CLP grant to build a sister school relationship between her home school in China, Yichang Foreign Language Junior High School, and Nettlehorst Elementary in Chicago, Illinois, which is in the same district as her host school in the U.S. The relationship started with a pen-pal program, joint-classroom projects, and the establishment of a Chinese Club at Nettlehorst Elementary and will develop into an in-person student exchange. The visit to the U.S. took place in the summer for about two weeks as a summer camp.
Gu Zhen received a CLP grant to develop and lead a workshop to share the effective teaching methodologies and teaching practices, that she learned in the United States, with English as a Foreign Language teachers from her home school and sister schools in China. She worked with other TCLP alumni to show how they apply what they learned from their TCLP experience to their home classroom teaching.
