Chinese Summer Immersion Program

Chinese Online Dictionaries:
www.archchinese.com
www.yellowbridge.com
www.nciku.com

Over the summer, we will be posting tips to help you help your children progress in their language abilities!

For information on our Chinese Summer Immersion Program, go to www.summerimmersion.com

Chinese Helpful Tip #1

Learning a foreign language takes consistent effort, but it can be fun too! One of the main ingredients to building a solid language foundation is having a large bank of vocabulary. Help your students have fun building their vocabulary over the summer by:

• Finding a small notebook that they can decorate and make their “Chinese _______ Book.” Let your child fill in the blank. It’s more fun that way and will create some pride and ownership for it.
• Find a special home for their new book so your child will always know where to find it. If you decide to take it out of the house, give it a special traveling place in the car or in a bigger bag.

Here are a couple of ways you can use this book:

1. Set aside 5 minutes a day to add to the book (make it the same every day so it will become a habit for you and your child not easily forgotten). You can have your child go to a place in your house and write down words of things they see that they don’t know how to say in Chinese. Then they can go to a computer and look up the words and write down the pinyin next to the English word. If they are interested in learning to write the character, they can write that as well.
• Other places they can go for new vocabulary: Grocery store, a ride in the car, outside your home, watching a movie or playing a game, etc.

2. Set aside a few minutes a day to have your student practice speaking Chinese either to him/herself, to you, or to a friend. Pick a topic that they can talk about and have them write down any words that they didn’t know how to say while they are talking. Then have them look up the words in an online dictionary and write down the pinyin in their notebook.
• Possible Topic Choices: Favorite ________ (movie, food, game, music), Vacations, What did I do yesterday?, What do I want to do tomorrow?, When I am ______, I want to…

It’s really important not only to find and learn new vocabulary, but to RETAIN that knowledge. Set aside time before bed to review and practice using the words (putting them in sentences, etc.), or help your child make a memory game with the words in their notebook. There are endless options for fun ways to learn new vocabulary. Note: Kids love white boards, and they are especially useful for learning Chinese characters. You can get cheap ones at the dollar store.