I’d like to share with the skritter community a little bit about the summer Chinese teacher training program that 高健 (Jacob Gill) and I attended in Beijing this past summer (the ACC K-12 Chinese teacher training program). The program was organized jointly through ACC (associated colleges in China) out of Hamilton College (in NY) and Hanban. Hanban is the Chinese organization that builds Confucius Institutes all around the world to promote the Chinese language and Chinese culture. ACC is well known for its academic rigor and intensity among College students who study abroad in China. All of its programs have a language pledge, so that the participants all commit to only speak Chinese for the duration of the program.
The goal of the summer program was to improve the Chinese proficiency and further the professional development of non-native speaking Chinese language teachers from the US. During the six weeks of the program we lived in a hotel on the campus of 北京民族大学 (Běijīng Mínzú Dàxué, Beijing Nationality University). We spent an average of 3 hours in Chinese language classes on weekdays plus a bunch of extra group discussions on teaching theory, guest lectures on Chinese culture, and visits to schools in Beijing to observe a whole variety of teaching situations.
The student/teacher ratio was ideal with only 10 students and 7 teachers. On weekdays we started with an hour long 一对一 (yī duì yī, one on one) session with one of the Chinese teachers. During the 一对一 we had a structured conversation with one of the teachers to practice using the grammar patterns and vocabulary covered in the day’s lesson. Then we moved on to 小班课 (xiǎo bān kè, small class) and 大班课 (dà bān kè, large class). Both the 小班 and 大班 classes had only five students each. 高健 wrote a great post on the 填鸭式 (tiányāshì, stuff the duck) teaching style there. Basically we spent a full two hours mimicking every utterance of the teacher in military unison, drilling the patterns into our brains through rote repetition. I agree with 高健 that this approach was very effective for learning large amounts of grammar patterns and vocabulary quickly. I probably wouldn’t have been able to handle the full six weeks of stuff-the-duck style classes if it hadn’t been for all the other opportunities during the day to express my own opinions. For one of the teaching demonstrations 高健, another classmate, and I created a the short video to practice teaching bargaining skills.
One of the highlights of the program for me was visiting the 海外学年 (Hǎiwài xuénián, Year of Study Abroad) school in Beijing to talk with the Chinese teachers there and observe classes. The program is really unique because it brings American kids, junior high through high school students, to Beijing to live with a Chinese host family for a full school year and take Chinese language and culture classes. The program usually hosts several trips throughout the year as well. I was really impressed by the Chinese language skills of the students there. Some of the students who go through the program there will probably stick with Chinese and by the time they get to college they will already be fluent speakers of Chinese.
Another highlight of the program for me was our visit to 北京师范大学 (Běijīng Shīfàn Dàxué, Beijing Normal University) having the opportunity to answer questions in Chinese about the teaching situation in K-12 schools in the US. The ten students from our program served as “experts on the US education system” and answered questions individually from a group of 100 Chinese teachers who were all preparing to spend the next year in the US through Hanban teaching Chinese in k-12 schools. Above is a picture of the crowd of Chinese teachers. It was really a rush because I’ve never had a chance to speak to such a large group before in English, let alone in Chinese.
If you are currently teaching Chinese in the US or considering going that direction, I’d definitely recommend applying for the ACC K-12 Chinese teacher training program. It is a great opportunity to be funded to spend a summer in China doing intense language study. If the six week stuff-the-duck extravaganza in Beijing isn’t your bag, you might consider one of the other summer Chinese teacher training opportunities cropping up. Hamilton College in conjunction with STARTALK hosts a two-week long Chinese teacher training program at their campus in New York. The Confucius Institute in Indianapolis has a weekend workshop every September. There is also an opportunity for three weeks of teaching practice and professional development at the Confucius Institute at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.