Fluency in Mandarin Chinese is no easy task, requiring recognition and understanding of some 3,000 characters. Hawken Lower School Chinese language teacher Chunlan Liu attended an intense 10-day workshop at Massachusetts’ Holy Cross College this summer that brought together master teachers of Chinese to develop Web-based teacher-training programs that can accelerate that learning process. The more than 250 students, age 4 to 12, in Liu’s various classes may experience Chinese dancers one day and take part in computer-assisted learning sessions the next.

Q: What is the biggest challenge of teaching Chinese to young Americans?

A: The biggest challenge for young children in America is limited exposure to the native language. Most of my students’ families don’t have any Chinese background. Secondly, the students’ foreign language class time is way below the level of other countries learning English. Mandarin Chinese is a very different system from Western language. It takes a long time to learn.

Q: What was the main focus of the master teacher workshop?

A: The focus was literacy, and the Web-based materials we developed target character recognition and production and reading comprehension. I want to update and refine the Hawken Lower School Chinese program and I’m going to further promote the application of computer technology in Chinese teaching. I love to use technology to teach.

Q: What have your students taught you?

A: The little ones love to speak the language, and the older ones enjoy Chinese history and writing Chinese characters. When we talk about the Chinese New Year, we not only look at how it’s celebrated, but who celebrates it.