Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

A lot of American students love Chinese in New York.

http://english.cntv.cn/20120118/111575.shtml

"Just love Chinese"

By David Lariviere (China Daily)

Confucius program is growing in popular appeal, David Lariviere reports from a New York class.

Danmei Nina Wu's sixth-grade class, at 8:55 on a bright morning, seemed more like musical theater than language learning.

There was rhythmic chanting and loud clapping. Three students stood at the front of the smallish classroom holding the Chinese flag and sang the Chinese national anthem. Sign language was prominent, and a spirited ribbon dance was performed.

Finally, for the showstopper, all 25 students formed a semicircle and performed the school song with great pride and joy. And not a word of English was spoken.

"Nu li xue hao zhong wen, shi wo men de li xiang. Mei ge ai wo zhong wen ban ya, kuai le de da jia ting." The English translation is: Learning Chinese successfully is our dream. MECPS Chinese class, happy big family.

And these were 11-year-old African-Americans in Brooklyn, New York, attending Medgar Evers College Preparatory School led by Michael Wiltshire, the principal, and Jean Adilifu, assistant principal for foreign languages.

About 30 percent of the 1,100 students in grades 6 through 12 take a Chinese class, and some take six years with Advanced Placement offered. "It's the largest number of students of African-American heritage, under one roof, taking sustained Chinese language instruction in the country," Adilifu said, beaming.

To say the students are motivated is an understatement. "From the sixth grade, I always said I wanted to be a neurosurgeon," said senior Sadiki Wiltshire, the principal's son. "As the years progressed, I still wanted to, but I realized it would be better if I extended my network to not just America but all over the world.

"Because of my love for Chinese, I realized that I love languages, period. When I go to college I want to study Russian, Korean and Japanese. When you break the language barrier, there's nothing you can't do," he said. "You can do anything."

Young Wiltshire, now an AP scholar with distinction, was one of the first Medgar Evers students required to take Chinese in the sixth grade. Six years later, he already has college credits and is looking at attending Ivy League universities such as Harvard, Penn, Yale and Princeton.

Spanish and French are the other options once the students reach the ninth grade, but students can continue with Chinese if they wish.

More than language

Medgar Evers is one of 100 school districts nationally that the Asia Society supports with its Confucius Classroom program. "We look at programs which are focusing on a much larger agenda and are using language instruction as a lever to be globally competent," said Chris Livaccari, the society's director of education and Chinese language initiatives.

"We've capped the program at 100 districts because of resources and capacity. If we go beyond that, we would be doing a disservice to our current members."

"My main thing is I just love Chinese. It's so fun," Devin Johnson, 11, said. "The way Laoshi (Chinese for teacher) Wu teaches it, we might go at a pace that everybody can understand, and once we get it, we just go on. I thought Chinese was going to be really, really hard, hard to understand, but once you think about it, it's really easy."

Wu, in her sixth year at the school, is from East China's Fujian province and taught college in China for 16 years before coming to the United States in 1999. She got some training from Hanban, a government-affiliated institute for promoting the Chinese language and culture abroad.

"I wanted to teach Chinese to non-native students and we have a very supportive leadership team," Wu said. "What I believe is that you're not just learning the Chinese language but you are learning the Chinese culture as well. You learn to communicate, but the culture gives them diversity."

Leilah Camille, 11, got the message. "It's definitely a new experience and it's fun and all the tests are easy. The way Laoshi Wu teaches is very easy to learn. We don't just learn dances, we learn the culture and we have so much fun."

Is the dominance of English now being challenged by the rise of Mandarin?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17105569

English has been the dominant global language for a century, but is it the language of the future? If Mandarin Chinese is to challenge English globally, then it first has to conquer its own backyard, South East Asia.

In Malaysia's southernmost city of Johor Bahru, the desire to speak good English has driven some children to make a remarkable two-hour journey to school every day.

Nine-year-old Aw Yee Han hops on a yellow mini van at 04:30. His passport is tucked inside a small pouch hung around his neck.

This makes it easier for him to show it to immigration officials when he reaches the Malaysian border.

His school is located on the other side, in Singapore, where unlike in Malaysia, English is the main language.

It's not your typical school run, but his mother, Shirley Chua thinks it's worth it.

"Science and maths are all written in English so it's essential for my son to be fluent in the language," she says.

An estimated 15,000 students from southern Johor state make the same bus journey across the border every day. It may seem like a drastic measure, but some parents don't trust the education system in Malaysia - they worry that the value of English is declining in the country.

Since independence from the British in 1957, the country has phased out schools that teach in English. By the early 1980s, most students were learning in the national language of Malay.

As a result, analysts say Malaysian graduates became less employable in the IT sector.

"We've seen a drastic reduction in the standard of English in our country, not just among the students but I think among the teachers as well," says political commentator Ong Kian Ming.

Those who believe that English is important for their children's future either send their kids to expensive private schools or to Singapore, where the government has been credited as being far-sighted for adopting the language of its former colonial master.

Nearly three-quarters of the population in Singapore are ethnic Chinese but English is one of the national languages and very widely-spoken.

Many believe that this has helped the city state earn the title of being the easiest place to do business, by the World Bank.

However, the dominance of English is now being challenged by the rise of China in Singapore.

The Singapore Chinese Chamber Institute of Business has added Chinese classes for business use in recent years.

Students are being taught in Mandarin rather than the Hokkien dialect spoken by the older Chinese immigrants.

These courses have proved popular, ever since the government began providing subsidies for Singaporeans to learn Chinese in 2009 during the global financial crisis.

"The government pushed to provide them with an opportunity to upgrade themselves so as to prepare themselves for the economic upturn," says chamber spokesperson Alwyn Chia.

Some businesses are already desperate for Chinese speakers.

Lee Han Shih, who runs a multimedia company, says English is becoming less important to him financially because he is taking western clients to do business in China.

"So obviously you need to learn English but you also need to know Chinese," says Mr Lee.

As China's economic power grows, Mr Lee believes that Mandarin will overtake English. In fact, he has already been seeing hints of this.

"The decline of the English language probably follows the decline of the US dollar.

"If the renminbi is becoming the next reserve currency then you have to learn Chinese."

More and more, he says, places like Brazil and China are doing business in the renminbi, not the US dollar, so there is less of a need to use English.

Bilingualism
Indeed, China's clout is growing in South East Asia, becoming the region's top trading partner.

But to say that Mandarin will rival English is a "bit of a stretch", says Manoj Vohra, Asia director at the Economist Intelligence Unit.

Even companies in China, who prefer to operate in Chinese, are looking for managers who speak both Mandarin and English if they want to expand abroad, he says.

"They tend to act as their bridges."

So the future of English is not a question of whether it will be overtaken by Mandarin, but whether it will co-exist with Chinese, says Vohra.

He believes bilingualism will triumph in South East Asia.

It is a sound economic argument, but in Vietnam's case, there is resistance to learning Mandarin.

The country may share a border with China, but the Vietnamese government's choice to not emphasise Mandarin is an emotional one, says leading economist Le Dang Doanh.

"All the streets in Vietnam are named according to generals and emperors that have been fighting against the Chinese invasion for 2000 years," he says.

Tensions flared up again last May over the disputed waters of the South China Sea.

Anti-Chinese sentiment means that young Vietnamese are choosing to embrace English - the language of a defeated enemy. Many families still bear the psychological scars from the Vietnam War with the United States.

Yet there is no animosity towards English because the founding father of Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh, made a clear distinction between the so-called American imperialists who were bombarding Vietnam and the American people, says Le Dang Doanh.

Many Vietnamese who have lost family members during the war are now studying in America, he says.

"We never forget any victim in the past but in order to industrialise and normalise a country, Vietnam needs to speak English."

The Vietnamese government has an ambitious goal to ensure all young people leaving school by 2020 will have a good grasp of the English language.

But it's not hard for young Vietnamese to accept English. For some, the language offers a sense of freedom in Vietnam, where the one-party communist state retains a tight grip on all media.

In a public square in central Hanoi, a group of young men are break-dancing to the pulsing beats of western hip hop. Ngoc Tu, 20, says he only listens to English music.

"The Ministry of Culture has banned a lot of [Vietnamese] songs and any cultural publications that refer to freedom or rebellion but... English songs are not censored."

It is debatable whether English or Mandarin will dominate in South East Asia in the future. There are arguments for both on the economic front.

But culturally, there is no dispute.

Even Mandarin language enthusiasts like Singaporean businessman Mr Lee, says that English will remain popular so long as Hollywood exists.

The success of movies such as Kung Fu Panda, an American production about a Chinese animal, has caused a lot of anxiety in China, he says.

There have been many cartoons in China about pandas before, but none had reached commercial success, says Mr Lee.

"The moment Kung Fu Panda hit the cinemas everybody watched it. They bought the merchandise and they learned English."

Learning Chinese in American schools.

        
         Learning Chinese in American schools. Young Americans from all walks of life are learning to speak Chinese in elementary and secondary schools. Key educators and politicians weigh in on the global advantage of studying Mandarin.

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles

Speak Chinese, speak success. Learn Chinese at Chinese Language Academy of los Angeles