Chinese

The Year 7 Mandarin Chinese course acquaints students with some fascinating aspects of Chinese language and culture through simple listening, speaking, reading and writing activities. Communication tasks in Chinese will utilise computer games, a bargaining unit and simple role-plays. Students will learn basic communication techniques such as self-introduction, greetings and conversation for daily life.

The course will give students some experience in writing the language in both pinyin and Chinese characters.

Some fundamental aspects of Chinese culture will be studied. These will include the Chinese Spring Festival and Chinese food.

The Year 8 course in Mandarin Chinese builds on the basic concepts of Chinese introduced in Year 7, but new students require no previous experience.

Students will develop their ability to talk about themselves, their daily life and immediate experiences. Writing skills will focus upon the acquisition of characters so that students can read and write basic sentences and short plays. They will have the opportunity to use their computers for writing Chinese.

A modern textbook developed in Australia for use by Australian students forms the basis of this course and will be supplemented by other internet resources.

The cultural aspect of this course will include a basic exploration of Chinese tradition and will introduce students to China’s more recent history and contemporary events.