Class Description

This beginning course is to provide a basic introduction to the language of Mandarin Chinese and culture. Designed for students with little or no previous exposure to the target language, the course will go over major characteristics of the language, such as the tones, Pinyin system, and the writing system. It will also help develop learners’ senses of the basic structural forms of the target language to make meanings in communication.

Multiple topics in real life will be introduced in the course. Starting from their immediate environment, students will learn to use the target language to describe themselves and their family in the culturally-appropriate contexts. They will use common expressions and polite greetings to exchange basic information for basic topics, such as name, residence, family members, school, weather and season, days of the week, dates, time, activities, food and drink, and color and clothes, etc.

Students will have frequent teacher and peer interactions throughout the 12-class session. This course provides students with substantial opportunities for oral presentations. Students will practice frequently to communicate with each other in Chinese. This will be a highly interactive and engaging language class, and it will be fun, too!

Teacher’s Biography

Ms. Chia-Chi Hsiung has served as a volunteer, a resource teacher, and a classroom teacher in Chinese schools in the Washington Metropolitan Area for several years. She has taught K-12 and adult learners at various language levels. She is capable of providing effective instruction to meet the needs of language learners from different age groups and backgrounds.

Ms. Hsiung is a current licensed Chinese language teacher in Virginia. She received her Foreign Language Licensure Graduate Certificate from the program of M.Ed. in Curriculum and Instruction at George Mason University and received her VA Postgraduate Teaching License in 2015. Ms. Hsiung was certified as Superior at ACTFL in Oral Proficiency Interview (OPI) and Writing Proficiency Test (WPT).

Required Textbook

Sun, Yi-Fen eds., Let’s Learn Chinese (學華語向前走). Taipei: Overseas Community Affairs Council (OCAC), Republic of China (Taiwan). 2017.