What goes in on your child’s classroom? If you don’t speak Mandarin, it’s a little hard to know. What follows is a pretty direct transcription of a morning Mandarin class for second graders, to give you an idea.
A fall morning in Mrs. Chau’s 2nd grade Mandarin class, Starr King Elementary School,San Francisco
All italics indicate spoken Mandarin.
The day starts with their routine – what day of the week is it, what day of the month is it? They also do math problems, based on counting money. Children get up to point at the day’s calendar, counting out numbers, then Ms. Chau puts some problems on the board, based on some of the number they’ve used, and children get up to answer them.
Then the weather report
Today, the weather is rainy. They say in unison. Who’s going to take roll?
Who’s going to count how many girls we have today? How many boys?
They count, then Mrs. Chau writes the numbers up on the board.
Today there are 11 children in the class, five boys and six girls. It’s winter and a lot of kids are sick.
Then they review the characters and phrases they’ve learned this week.
9:05
The kids go to their cubbies to get their Chinese textbooks and bring them to their desks.
Mrs. Chau sets up an overhead projector attached to her computer. She shows a video of leaves falling on a fall scene.
What do they do? When do they fall?
What’s today? Is it fall now?
She points to everything on the image on the screen and has the children name it, then posts a Post it with the name in characters next to it.
She gives plenty of encouragement to the children answer, especially a boy having trouble, when he tries and gets the name right.
The children talk amongst themselves in English for the most part.
Mrs. Chau hands the Post it’s to each child, so they each get one.
Then she says “Who’s got rain?” and the child with rain runs up and put it on the picture
What do you need for rain?
An umbrella!
Right? Who’s got the umbrella? And that child runs up to paste it on the board
Great! She says.
What’s this? It’s a goose? Who’s got the goose? What else rides in the water? A boat? Who’s got the boat?
For children who do a good job, she goes to her student board and moves a marker into their Good folder.
9:10
She directs them to their books.
They all read from the lesson in unison. Mrs. Chau goes from table to table, making sure the kids are all on the right line of the books.
Now I’m going to ask you some questions. She picks up questions from the board. Who was the story about?
They all raise their hands, some of them get good markers for putting their hands up.
Who sings? Right, the birds sing.
What time is it there?
Where do the birds live?
What place?
Outside? Outside the house!
Where do the birds fly.
They fly in the air, the kids answer.
Everyone who answers gets a Good marker.
Where are the birds going?
South for the winter.
One young boy is having a hard time sitting still. She asks him to sit by her desk until he can be a little calmer.
What makes a boat go? She mimics paddling a boat, and they say “paddling!”
9:20
She pulls up the video again and goes through the new vocabulary. She breaks the class into groups and they gather on the rug. Each has an area to sit in.
They read phrases aloud on the video. But they interrupt each other, so she points to the classroom rules over her head, written in Chinese over the board and has them read them aloud to her.
If you want to talk, raise your hand.
Don’t interrupt the teachers
Don’t talk or wiggle while you’re having class.
Don’t interrupt your fellow students
They all listen intently as the tells them they have to be respectful of her and each other so they can listen and learn
So do you interrupt each other?
No!
If we aren’t ready to learn, we can’t read and understand.
She raises her hand and waits until they all raise their hands and then are quiet, then she says again that she’s got a lot of work for them to get through and wants them to concentrate.
You need to be calm and quite, ready to learn when you come to class
What’s green in this picture? It’s in front of the house. It’s the grass.
What’s on the side of the house? It’s a leaf.
All of this is from her computer, via the overhead.
She goes through the new words again
You guys are doing great.
9:35
She goes through a series of sentences on the overhead with them, all using the word ‘cong’ which means from.
Are you from China?
Who is from where?
I’m from Taiwan, I came to the United States.
Can you all come up with some sentences using ‘cong,’? For example, where are your mom and dad from?
She gives a bunch of examples so they understand.
One uses the word for restaurant, someone says ‘What’s a restaurant?’ and she mimics eating and they say “Ah, I get it.”
Students come up with these sentences and Mrs. Chau writes them on the board:
My little sister came from China, one writes.
I came from my mama’s tummy, another says. How do I write ‘tummy?” and Ms. Chau writes it.
I’m from Europe, one says.
She hands out the word sheets to students one at a time and they go to their tables to do the work.
You can use your text books to help you, she says.
9:40 they break up to sit down and do their worksheets.
I want to hear quiet voices and then I’ll come around and look at your sentences
One of the students asks how to write Europe and she writes the characters on the board for them.
Ms. Chau, is there such a thing as Chinese cursive?
You, she says. You write it with a brush. It’s very beautiful.
Can you write Chinese cursive with a pen?
Yes.
How do you write ‘at’?
She points it out on their list of vocabulary on the wall.
Have you finished? She asks one boy. Let me look.
Children get up and go to the vocabulary list to check how to write characters.
One they’re done, they put their homework in a clipboard and then get to sit on the rug and look at books
Mrs. Chou goes through their worksheets, which they bring up to her, and she reads them aloud and makes sure they’re right. One girl didn’t write ‘come’, she wrote ‘old’, Mrs. Chau points it out and has her go back and correct it.
As they finish the kids crowd near the bookcase, choosing books to read during their free time and then settling in on the carpet to read.
One kid has confused ‘have’ and ‘come’, She writes both on the board for him.
One boy brings his homework up. I really like this sentence, this is a good one she says.
Mandarin Immersion Parents Council 