We had a language lesson today. We learned how to ask another person's name and how to ask what your name is. Please keep praticing them.

Your homework is do some research and find out answers to the following questions:
1. Do Chinese people celebrate Christmas now?

2. What is the biggest holiday in China? How do Chinese people celebrate it?

Please be specific when you are presenting your finding.

Today we cooked delicous Chinese spring roll.  It is a pretty complicated process, but you all did a great job. Thanks Kyle to hel pme cleaning the kitchen.

Since you need to get specialty ingridients, I won't ask you to make the spring roll on your own. If you want a receipe, please come to me and ask for it.

zaijian !

Today we watched an interesting documentary film called " Please vote for me". Through three 8 elementary school students' election for Ban Zhang( similiar to class president) position, the film shows us how Chinese people understand democracy and the election system.

Next class, we are going to finish the movie. The home for you is to think about what you see and hears and comment on the following three questions. Please write your notes down in bullet points so that you won't forget when it is your turn to talk.
1. How do you describe the personalities of Xiao Fei, Luo Lei and Cheng Cheng? Based on your understanding about the role of Ban Zhang, who do you think has the most desirable personality?
2. Comment on the election strategies of each of the candidates.
3. Put yourself into their shoes and see if it is you in that classroom, what will you do?

zai jian !

Today we cooked our first Chinese food, the Scallion Pancake. you all did a great job and it turned out really nice. Now, you have a week's time to do the dish on your own for your family. Below is the receipe. Please either take a photo to show me, or let your parent to email me about your cooking process. That counts for your home work.


good luck and happy cooking!

Recipe for Scallion Pancake

·         2 cups all purpose flour

·         1 cup hot water

·         1/2 cup sliced scallions

·         1 tablespoon sesame oil

·         1/2 cup canola oil

·         Salt and black pepper to taste

Directions

In a bowl, sift flour. Slowly add water in a steady stream while mixing with a wooden spoon. Keep adding water until a ball is formed. With the same procedure, one can use a food processor with a metal blade. Let ball of dough relax for about 30 minutes and cover with damp cloth.
On a floured surface, roll out dough into a thin circle. Brush on oil mixture, cover with scallion and season with salt and pepper. Carefully roll dough like a sponge cake. Cut into 4 pieces. Take one piece and twist 3 times. Make a spiral out of this and roll again and flatten to achieve a 5 to 6 inch pancake. In a hot non-stick pan, coat with canola oil and pan sear both sides until golden brown. Cut into wedges and serve immediately with dipping sauce.

You all did a great job with presentation on Southern China.! On Friday, I will be out of town for a conference. So, your sub teacher will continue to show an episode of China to you. If I don't have a chance to see you before the break, I wish all of you Happy Thanksgiving.

Today's homework: we learned how to count to 100. I want you to practice them as many times as possible and then record your counting on my Google Voice number 315-400-1674.

take care,

zai jian

Today we watched an episode of Chinese documentary film on South China, which is called " Heart of Dragon".  The area the film covered includes the following four provinces: An Hui, Guangxi, Yunan and Guizhou.

You need to do some researches on the above mentioned places and present it during class. You can develop a ppt, or word document.  The topics you need to cover are: People( ethnic groups in that area), Food and Cuisine, landscape or topography of that area; special animals or plants in that area. I want you to keep a comparative mindset while you are doing your research between China and the U.S.A.

zai jian!

Welcome to Chinese Kaleidoscope class for the 2nd quarter students. We are going to have a fun time learning some interesting and wonderful things about China and Chinese culture.

Last class, we learned how to read and write your Chinese names. Please continue to practice them at home. When you come back, I will ask you to write the names on the board and gradually, you should do it with needing to use handout for references.

Next class, we are going to watch a documentarty film about China.

zai jian !

This week we have summed up our first quarter of Chinese study. Thank you all for bringing the food on Monday. Today we reviewed the vocabularies we have learned and you all created beautiful caligraphy and paintings. What a great progress compared to the first one you made in the beginning of the quarter..

再见！

We had a good discussion about the relationship between U.S and China. Great job to everyone who presented your facts and comments.

Today we learned about our body part. Please continue to draw and mark your portraits if you are not finished and bring back to class to share.

We also learned our Happy Birthday song. Here is the link if you want to practice at home. 祝你生日快乐

We are going to have our last class celebration on Monday, the last block on 10/29. Please bring in the item you have signed up for.

xieixe!

In that past two classes, we made dumplings together and they turn out nicely. We also learned the colors in Chinese and sang together. Today, your homework is going to do some research: Right now, there are a lot of debates on whether China is a threat to the U.S. During presidential debate, both candidates use China to attact each other's policy. Do you think China is a threat to the U.S? If so, how so? If not, why not? Please list your reasons when you come back and debate.

zai jian

Today we learned how to make self-introduction in Chinese. You did great. Many of you have also made scallion pancakes for your family. I am glad that some of your family members like it. Please remember if it didn't turn out well that there is no naturally great cook. It took lots of practice and hard work.

Today's homework is for you to do research and orally report on your answers: you can choose one of the two topics:
1. The Great Wall of China: what is it? When it was builit? how long is the wall? the current siutation of the wall？

2。Maco Polo: who is he? what did he do? Find some interesting points aobut him that helped the World to know about China.

再见！

Today we reviewed vocabulary on self-introduction. We learned new vocabulary and sentences on how to ask another person for names and also how to answer if you are being asked. You did  a great job reviewing the materials. We also cooked scallion pancak today. Here is a receipe if you forgot some of the steps.You homework assignment will be making a scallion pancake for your family.

Recipe for Scallion Pancake

·         2 cups all purpose flour

·         1 cup hot water

·         1/2 cup sliced scallions

·         1 tablespoon sesame oil

·         1/2 cup canola oil

·         Salt and black pepper to taste

Directions

In a bowl, sift flour. Slowly add water in a steady stream while mixing with a wooden spoon. Keep adding water until a ball is formed. With the same procedure, one can use a food processor with a metal blade. Let ball of dough relax for about 30 minutes and cover with damp cloth.
On a floured surface, roll out dough into a thin circle. Brush on oil mixture, cover with scallion and season with salt and pepper. Carefully roll dough like a sponge cake. Cut into 4 pieces. Take one piece and twist 3 times. Make a spiral out of this and roll again and flatten to achieve a 5 to 6 inch pancake. In a hot non-stick pan, coat with canola oil and pan sear both sides until golden brown. Cut into wedges and serve immediately with dipping sauce.

Today we learned how to greet people and how to introduce one's nationality. We also played the number games. You are all getting better and better with your accounting. Today you are going to do some research about a Chinese festival, which is called Moon Festival. You need to develop a power point, showing the following points:
1. Special holiday food.
2. The origin and story behind the festival.
3. Main characters in the story
4. Different ways of celebration for this holiday.

再见！

We discussed the assignment about the three candidates in the film Please Vote For Me and you all did a great job analyzing their strength,weakness and characters. The homework today is for you to write up a election campaign plan for yourself, imaging yourself to be a 3 or 4th grader running for Class President in America.  Please cover the following topic:
1. Your campaign plan.
2. Are you going to enlist your parents for help？
3。What do you think democracy should be like in a election like this?

再见

We watched a Chinese documentary file called " Please vote for me". In this movie, three 3rd grade students are running for Class Monitor in a elementary school in Wuhuan city, China.  This film vividly shows how the Chinese interpret the concept of "democracy". Today, you assignment is to write out a small paper analyzing the three main characters: Luo Lie, Xu Xiaofei, and Cheng Cheng.  Please focus on how each one of them interpret and act out on the following: carry out Democracy in their own way; understand Authority and Power; dealing with their parents' value and influences.


Please be ready to present your paper in front of class next time.

Today we learned Chinese characters for numbers. You all did a great job. Please keep practicing them so that you can come back to the class on Tuesday ready to be quizzed.  We are going to talk about education system in China next week and hopefully, if the kitchen is fixed, we can start to cook some Chinese food.

zaijian!

You all did a great job presenting your findings on the research topics I posed last class.  During class, we finished watching the Beijing Olympic Opening Ceremony and talked about the cultural symbolism behind each program. You next two research topics are:
1. differences between Northern and Southern Diet in China
2. Please find out the storyline about 5 Chinese martial art movies in the United States and comment on it.


Hopefully by next week, our kitchen area can be cleaned out so we can start cooking some Chinese food.

再见

Today we talked about the Chinese 2008 Olympic game and watched the beginning of the opening ceremony. The performances are very rich in cultural notes and symbols, such as characters, water painting, opera, and silk road.

Here are two topics for you to do some research on. You can choose one of them to do an oral report on them:

1. What are the Four Biggest Chinese inventions in history?

2. What is the current situation of the Olympic facilities in Beijing?


You can list our bullet points for your presentation during class, but you don't need to do a written report on it.


zai jian ! 再见

Welcome to MPH Chinese Kaleidoscope for year 2012-13. I am looking forward to spending a great time together with our students.  Here is a brief description about our class:

This class is designed to give you an interesting and general introduction about one of the fastest growing nation in the world: China.  You will have a quarter to study this, which is roughly 9 weeks long. During this time, we are going to learn the following four topics:  1. Chinese language system 2.   History and Current affairs . 3.  Art and culture 4. Cooking. Each topic will last for about two weeks.

For the Chinese language system, we give students a brief introduction about Chinese phonetic system, character writing system as well as some of the most commonly used expressions covering greeting, numbers, names, and self-introduction.  Students will learn how to write their names and some basic Chinese characters.

For History and Current affairs, we will introduce the formation and development of the concept of China and Chinese, and then watch movies and films which will reinforce students' understanding about the political and economic development in China as well as critical social issues around China and East Asia.

For Art and Culture, we are going to practice Chinese calligraphy using ink and brushes. Students also have opportunities to learn how to do origami and paper cuts.

For cooking, we are going to learn more about the Chinese culinary art. We will start from scratch and learn how to do food preparation, using species and use various cooking methods. Students will learn how to make some of the most representatives of the Chinese dishes, from dumplings to scallion pancakes.