Dragon Boat Festival Calendar

Dragon Boat Festival Race Event Calendar has been updated - thanks everybody who sent in corrections!. Dragon Boating is much bigger than I thought it was. For some reason I had this picture of each team building their boats. Nope, their are actually manufacturers who focus on this area.

Some Dragon Boat Manufacturers I found in the US:

• Six-Sixteen Dragon Boats Ltd.
• Kayak Pro

Mice and Men & the Chinese Experience

My family last night saw Of Mice and Men at Theatre Banshee in Burbank. They did a wonderful job! It is about two male farm workers during the depression in California. And earlier that day I had met a person who's family (Japananese) was from Hawaii and had been plantation workers.

Before WW2, Chinese in the US were usually male and worked on farms as laborers. A similar situation to the two workers in Of Mice and Men. At the time Chinese were not allowed to own land or enter into mixed race marriages. History of racism against Chinese in the US.

Learning Chinese Video's

There are a lot of Learning Chinese Video's out there and the quality of them really varies. Some of them have poor production quality. The other challenge is different audiences. What may be great for a family that does not speak Chinese, would be rated poorly by a Family that speaks Chinese at home (trust me, I have seen the reviews that prove this).

My section of DVD's - Learning Chinese & Culture

Some products I carry:

				Follow Jade - Let's Visit Chinese Kindergarten in DVD
				Our Price: $24.95 Sale Price: $19.95 You Save $5.00!
				Award Winning Children Learning Chinese DVD from Jade Qian, 30 minutes long. Jade incorporates basic Chinese words into everyday conversation about topics familiar to children using her special bilingual and activity based method. For ages 2-6.

				Early Start Mandarin Chinese with Bao Bei the Panda #1, 2, 3, and 4
				Our Price: $79.80 Sale Price: $69.95 You Save $9.85!
				This introductory learning Chinese DVD series includes Volume 1: Colors and Animals, Volume 2: Numbers and Fruits, Volume 3: A Wonderful Day, Volume 4: My Healthy Body. Stimulating visuals keep kids coming back for more. Repetition encourages learning!

Fat Envelope Frenzy

Two reviews from the Wall Street Journal. Eye opening...

• 'Fat Envelope Frenzy One Year, Five Promising Students and The Pursuit of the Ivy League Prize'
• For a Lucky Few, Room at the Top

Wow! Great read which I am now carrying.

Fat Envelope Frenzy by Joie Jager-Hyman
Our Price: $14.95
Fat Envelope Frenzy by Joie Jager-Hyman. A former Ivy League admissions officer follows five bright and eager high schoolers--students from diverse ethnic, social, and financial backgrounds--as they each put their best foot forward on the road they hope will lead them to the hallowed halls of Harvard University. Jager-Hayman also offers a startling frank appraisal of the college admission process and the important roles race and class continue to play in a student's efforts to attend the best school possible.. English. Paperback. 231 Pages.

Chinese Summer Learning Programs K-12

There are a number of summer programs for Learning Chinese for K-12. Here is a list of Teaching Chinese Summer School programs in the US and overseas focused on non-native speakers.

Chinese Holidays and Festivals

Chinese Holidays and Festivals

1. Spring/Lunar New year/Chinese New Year Festival (pick your name). I put together an events calendar for the US and Canada, page of background information, lesson plan, etc.
   
2. Lantern Festival - Happens 15 days after Chinese New Year.
   
3. Dragon Head Festival
4. Clear and Bright Festival
5. Dragon Boat Festival - Information includes events calendar for the US & Canada and background information.
6. Double Seventh Night - Chinese Valentines Day
   
7. Mid Autumn Festival, Harvest Festival, Moon Festival - Information includes events calendar for the US & Canada and background information.
8. Double Ninth Day
9. Laba Festival - The Day Budha received enlightenment
   
10. Kitchen God Day
11. Children's Day - June 1st\
12. Ancestor Day or Tomb Sweeping Day - cleaning ancestor tombs is a big event.
13. Ghost Festival
    
14. Mid Winter Festival/Winter Solstice - Chinese Thanksgiving. The day to eat dumplings.
    

Dragon Boat Festival & Racing

I am in the process of updating my information on Dragon Boat Festival Event and Information . This section on Dragon Boats includes:

• Dragon Boat Calendar of Events for the US and Canada for 2008.
• Customs, Foods, and Background on the Dragon Boat Festival
• I am going to create a page of links for the 40 or so associations in the US.

Good books that have information about Dragon Boat racing are:


Good Luck Life: The Essential Guide To Chinese American Celebrations And Culture
Our Price: $14.95
It has a large section on the Dragon Boat Festival and Racing. 10+ pages if I remember. Best resource for learning about the Dragon Boat Festival A-Z I have seen. Provides a readable introduction to the legends, customs, traditions, festivals, and celebrations of Chinese culture and heritage, complete with trivia, drawings, charts, tables, recipes, and informative sidebars.
Moonbeams, Dumplings & Dragon Boats: A Treasury of Chinese Holiday Tales, Activities & Recipes
Our Price: $21.00 Sale Price: $19.95 You Save $1.05!
Has a couple pages on the Dragon Boat Festival, more for kids. Filled with delectable recipes, hands-on family activities and traditional tales to read aloud, this extraordinary collection will inspire families everywhere to re-create the magic of Chinese holidays in their own homes.


Awakening the Dragon - The Dragon Boat Festival
Our Price: $9.95
Only book I have seen 100% focused on the Dragon Boat Festival. By Arlene Chan, a respected librarian and an experienced dragon boat racer, explores the origins of the festival, customs, and the races themselves. Beautifully detailed illustrations by Song Nan Zhang let you experience the beauty and energy of this ancient festival.

Land of Opportunity - China?

For a new generation, land of opportunity may lie in China, not the US - Article from the NY Times via IHT.

Interesting article.

Key Points:

• 500 US public schools offer Mandarin with 3000 students taking the AP test for Chinese.
  
• 40 million people worldwide are learning Mandarin
• 100,000 foreigners went to China to study Mandarin in 2006. US was third in nations sending people to Learn Mandarin Chinese in China.
  
• Recent Gallup surveys in 13 Asian countries showed some 40 percent expect China to replace the U.S. as the leading superpower within the next 50 years.
• 51,600 studied Mandarin in the US in 2006.
  

Summary:
The article is a good complement to my Why Learn Chinese page. The article has a link to http://www.chinglish.com/, but does not mention Zhongwen which is probably because they had an interview with the owner of Chinglish.com.

Made in China - Violins, Cello's, pianos, and more!

Made in China conjures up images of low quality junk when it does not have a foreign brand name on it. From iPods to piano to cellos, so many are made in China due to lower labor costs.

There are basically three quality range for Pianos. The low end of the market that is made in China, Korea, and Indonesia. The medium range of the market is piano's made in Japan from Yamaha and Kawai. The high end is Steinway and German pianos such as Bosendorfer (my daughter loved test playing a 9'). There are some pianos that are made in China with German actions, to German design, etc. The made in China Pianos range in quality from poor to fair, the challenge is figuring out which one is good. Many pianos made in China now put on foreign names, such as Vienna for a European name. The quality of the Chinese brands is improving quickly and has resulted in them owning most of the lower end of the market. The challenge is some Chinese pianos have pretty good quality, and others are horrible. A great book to buy if you are looking to buy a Piano is the Piano Book by Larry Fine helps you sort through all the wonderful claims. We bought a Kawai piano after visiting many Piano shops. If your interested in an upright and in the Los Angeles area, we are selling our old one. Contact me for more information

Stringed instruments from China have taken over 80% of the market in the US. The challenge is figuring out the quality. So many of them have a foreign name plastered on them, resold by US companies, it's hard to tell where they came from. Music teachers often have a friend who sells instruments. Music teachers also get a bit upset when you buy from another place. One music teacher was upset that we bought from another person and told us how lousy our cello was. She then showed us the cello of another student, and it did not have tighteners on all the strings as she has pointed out our cello did not. Her credibility was gone after that so we changed teachers.

				Yang the Youngest and His Terrible Ear by Lensey Namioka
				Our Price: $4.50
				Nine-year-old Yang and his family have immigrated from China to Seattle and the father is a professional Violin Play. He has been giving Yang Violin lessons for years, and Yang hates the Violin. Yang discovers Baseball! A great story about fitting in and getting used to a new country and culture.

Simplified and Traditional Characters

China Daily News has an article about Simplified vs. Traditional Chinese Characters. The articles conclusion is they are equally good. Post I did about Simplified vs. Traditional Chinese Characters - Which to Learn

I disagree with a couple of points of the article "Jianti" and "fanti" are equally good.

1. My understanding is if you can read one, you can read the other. I would compare it from driving a stick shift to an automatic. If you can read simplified you can read traditional, which is why most of the Chinese newspapers in the US are in Traditional Characters. Traditional characters just has a few more strokes. If you read Traditional characters, going the other way is a bit harder since strokes are missing, but still doable. And people who say they can't read the other type of characters are more into politics.
   
2. Learning Simplified Characters is easier than traditional because there are less strokes. The counter argument is because traditional is more systematic, it's actually easier. The best comment I have read was when simplified characters were being created, they did not simplify it enough. They both require a huge amount of memorization. In English, we only need to deal with 27 sounds and rules that are not systematic (I taught ESL), but that's because English is a polygot language that has borrowed grammar and words from lots of languages.
   

Areas I agree with:

1. On the issue of writing, that is much more challenging. I like the argument that the use of computers make this a non-issue.
2. Traditional Characters have cultural significance.
3. Traditional Characters are prettier. It's amazing when you have someone with good handwriting write traditional characters, they are a work of art!

Mysteries - Why is it my Father in Laws Chinese writing is so much better than my wifes? Why is it my Grandmother's Enlglish handwriting is so much better than mine? Do people's handwriting improve as they get older? Or are schools just slacking off. My wife's answer is I am just lazy :-)

This is a wonderful book just to read on Chinese Characters! It's one of my favorite books at ChildBook. A great activity is buy the book, get some ink and brushes, and just have fun writing characters.

				Long Is A Dragon by Peggy Goldstein
				Our Price: $17.95 Sale Price: $15.95 You Save $2.00!
				Explains how Chinese writing developed and demonstrates how to write 75 Chinese Characters, using detailed instructions and examples, hardcover, English.

These are some book that are very popular for Learning Chinese Characters.

				Fun with Chinese Characters, Volume 3
				Our Price: $14.95
				Creative cartoons illustrate the origins to today's ideographs (characters). Each page elaborates on the origin, development of one character from a pictograph with an example of usage.
				Fun with Chinese Characters, Volume 2
				Our Price: $14.95
				Creative cartoons illustrate the origins to today's ideographs (characters). Each page elaborates on the origin, development of one character from a pictograph with an example of usage.
				Fun with Chinese Characters
				Our Price: $14.95
				Creative cartoons illustrate the origins to today's ideographs (characters). Each page elaborates on the origin, development of one character from a pictograph with an example of usage.

Product, Content, and Blog Feedback Needed

Suggestions on products, content, and blog posts I should add that you would find of value that are related to Learning the Chinese Language and/or Culture.

My goal with childbook is provide A+ grade Learning Chinese products at a great value/price with excellent customer service. Finding the right products can be more challenging than you one would expect :-)

Content, such as articles, free coloring pictures and projects, listings of Chinatowns, Chinese Festival Events such as Chinese New Year are meant to attract people to my site. The challenge is getting some of them to buy. Bandwidth is fairly cheap, but you get a huge amount of visitors the cheap bandwidth adds up.

This blog has given me the opportunity to write about some interesting subjects. It's challenging to figure out new posts that are Chinese related, stay away from politics (my business is selling products to learn Chinese and about the Chinese Culture, not get into political arguments) and I can understand why so many companies stop blogging after a month or two.

China, Tibet, and Taiwan?

NY Times article suggests what is going on in Tibet may influence Taiwan's election. Taiwan's election process is very exciting with Blue, Green, and for a while a Red party. US politics compared to that is pretty tame. DPP is the Green Party, KMT is the Blue party, and the Red Party just hates the guts of the Mr. Chen Shui-bian, the current President of Taiwan. Some people from the US even fly back to Taiwan just to vote.

Panda baiting is the term, that I just learned, of when the DPP attempts to upset China to get a reaction to sway voters at home. China at first played along beautifully, but lately has been attempting to just ignore Taiwan's politics.

Tip - It's a good idea to avoid discussions on Taiwan independence, politics, and such with Taiwanese and Chinese. These are pretty emotional issues.

Me - I try to stay out of it and just be a neutral observer at home.

Four Days Fluent - Learning Chinese!

Funny article from Forbes on a 4 Day Immersion for Learning Chinese, self taught plus language lessons at Berlitz. Since he is an adult the material he uses I am not carrying.

The subliminal method for learning Chinese is something I have not heard of before. I understand the frustration when he goes to Chinatown and everyone is speaking Cantonese around him. My challenge is people speaking Taiwanese around me :-)

The reason that people speak Cantonese is because overseas Chinese often speak Cantonese (from Vietnam for example). The other is immigrants to the US who came over during the Gold Rush spoke Cantonese. New immigrants from China speak Cantonese, and if from outside of Northern China (Beijing) their local dialect. Post I had about Why Learn Mandarin Chinese, not Cantonese

Items that were not used for studying, that I have heard good things about are (I doubt they would have helped much to be fluent in 4 days):

				Pimsleur Quick and Simple Mandarin Chinese: Mandarin
				Our Price: $19.95
				Pimsleur Quick and Simple Mandarin Chinese: Mandarin (Spoken Word Compact Disc)
				Pimsleur Conversational Mandarin Chinese
				Our Price: $49.95
				Pimsleur Conversational Mandarin Chinese in 8 CDs.
				Chinese For Dummies. Mandarin.
				Our Price: $19.99
				Chinese For Dummies. Mandarin. 3 hours of instruction on 3 CDs.

Second Life for Foreign Language Learners

Forbes article - How To Spark Remote Learning

With the increase in skype for doing Video Conferencing and live chat, I don't see the advantage of teaching a foreign language using Second Life. With video conferencing, it also helps you with the facial gestures that are so important. And from what I can tell, Second Life is mostly text based (I may be wrong on this). I heard a presentation on second life about six months ago by a person who had a business associated with pushing new media.

Discusses how some people are learning English using second life. I wonder if in the future this will be used for teaching other foreign languages.

What the article does not mention is that Second Life has been overhyped. For businesses from what I can tell Second Life is not a good investment at this time.

What second life does, as with other sites, is give a free method for practicing English. With a dedicated teacher I am sure payment will be needed.

Saving China's Past

Saving China's Past - Good article from the Wall Street Journal about how China is starting to preserve some of it's history. Chinese history goes back 5000 years.Transportation in Beijing with the new subways will reduce the need for new roads. Tourism is driving some of the calls for preservation.

Something that have not reconciled with yet that is a cultural issue. Chinese and Taiwanese love to buy new houses. My wife would much rather live in a new house, than a 100 year old house. The house I grew up in was built in 1917 and the city where I grew up in, Monrovia, has an old house tour every Mother's Day. This just shows the difference in culture.

				C is for China by Sungwan So
				Our Price: $7.95
				An alphabetical and photographic journey through China, depicting its people, customs, history, religion, and beliefs.

Why Learn to Speak Chinese?

I updated the page, now a section Why Learn Chinese? The goal was to make it easier to read and add more ideas that I have been exploring on the blogs in the various Posts I have done on why learn Chinese.

I started out with a greeting and joke I learned when I was teaching ESL, that ESL students loved:

• What is a person who knows three languages? - trilingual.
• What is a person who knows two languages? - bilingual.
• What is a person who knows only one language? - American.

Followed by three sub-pages to go into more details on important areas of Why Learn Chinese:

• Why Kids Should Learn to Speak Chinese?
• Excuses not to Learn Chinese
• Resources for Kids To Learn Chinese

It's an improvement over the one huge page that existed. The Resources for Kids To Learn Chinese seems to not belong on this page, but I wanted to show people who are interested in learning Chinese some of the resources available.

The reasons for Learning Chinese, Eight of them are much better. The reasons Why Kids Should Learn to Speak Chinese?

General: To take advantage of this huge economic shift and opportunities, learning to speak Chinese is a great way to give your children an advantage in the increasingly competitive business world. Not everyone in the world speaks English.

1. China is emerging from a period of stagnation and again taking it's place as one of the great powers of the world. China currently has the second largest economy in the world.
2. China has become the factory of the world and is moving up the technology food chain. Look at the balance of trade between the US and China. Per Nobel Prize Winner Robert Mundell China will become the factory of the world, in my opinion it already has. Now products are built, as well as designed in China.
3. Chinese culture is over 5000 years old. By learning the Chinese Language, Chinese you will learn another culture. Learning a language gives you a better understanding through the grammar and even how the words are derived of the culture behind them. There is a lot of Chinese Poetry that lose some meaning when translated.
4. China is a huge export market for the US. 1/5th of the world's population lives in China. Overseas Chinese dominate the economies of many countries in Asia, and speaking Mandarin gives you an edge in doing business with them. Countries with large overseas Chinese populations include Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, and Malaysia. China has become one of the largest trading partners with the US. Over 16,000 US companies sell products in China. Trade is not only from China to the US, but also the other way. $41.8 Billion in 2006.
5. The world is becoming a global economy. Per a famous book, the world is becoming flat so communication, ideas, and goods are traveling faster and faster between countries including the US and China. Learning Chinese gives you the opportunity to take advantage of this change. It's a great ice breaker when working with people from China if you can say a few words in Chinese. This helps especially when dealing with business people on the other side of the world via conference call.
6. Learning another language gives you another viewpoint. The word he uses, that is ll of meaning, is Kaleidoscope. It does seem to help mentally as you develop new areas of your brain. It also helps as people age. I once had a fun talk with a programmer explaining how learning a new computer language helped keep his mind fresh. It will also help you when ordering Chinese food.
7. Learning Chinese will give a student a competitive advantage. Chinese is the fastest growing Foreign Language being taught in US schools. I like Mayor Daly's quote: "We want to give our young people opportunities to advance ... and [Chinese] is a great opportunity to survive in today's economy."
8. Mandarin Chinese is the most taught foreign language after English in Japan. If the Japanese are learning it, shouldn't people in the US? Mandarin Chinese is the most used language on the Internet.

Excuses not to Learn Chinese is more of the original page I did on Why To Learn Chinese, that was focused on convincing Chinese speaking parents - who I thought my target customers were, but as usual in marketing once I started selling my target customers were a bit different!

Feedback on the Why Learn Chinese? Section is appreciated! Ray@childbook.com

Dual Piano Performance - Wow!

Amazing performance of dual piano players my family went to today.
Tengstrand-Sun Piano Duo

Husband and wife team. Husband is from Sweden, she is from China. He first performed at 7, she at 6. Amazing piano ability. So crisp and clear!


Related Books:






Yang the Youngest and His Terrible Ear by Lensey Namioka
Our Price: $4.50
Nine-year-old Yang and his family have immigrated from China to Seattle and the father is a professional Violin Play. He has been giving Yang Violin lessons for years, and Yang hates the Violin. Yang discovers Baseball! A great story about fitting in and getting used to a new country and culture.

Peter Drucker and China

There is a Peter F. Drucker Academy in China. Bright China Management Institute is running these academies and from I heard today from the Drucker Dean of the Biz School in Claremont (the original Drucker School), Ira Jackson, they have a huge amount of graduates. I do appreciate the two pages, Why Drucker and Who is Peter F. Drucker. I wish my school had that - hint, hint... The school assumes everyone knows who Peter Drucker is.

As a Drucker Alumni, and it's Peter's fault I started this business. In a class of his I took there was a requirement for a project, so I did one about starting an online business selling Chinese Children Books. He called me up in his class and discussed German in the US has been a popular second language with large community of German speakers. He pointed out how this community of German speakers disappeared. Reading more on it was due a lot to World war 1. More about Childbook's history. How I met Peter was at a welcoming picnic for incoming students, and my daughter almost tripped him. He was nice enough to take a picture with her (except I could not get a picture with both of them smiling at the same time).

I went to the first meeting of the Los Angeles Drucker Society today and I look forward to future meetings! There are a number of societies around, including China, and I recommend anyone interested in society and management to attend a meeting. For a great read, I suggest his autobiography, Adventures of a Bystander

Chinatown San Jose

There is an archeology dig being done in San Jose at the site of what was a Chinatown. An article from the local paper, the mercury news covers it. Path to Chinatown in San Jose lot and Excavation planned of former Chinatown in San Jose The article mentions how the previous Chinatown was burned, and how a German immigrant built a walled area to protect local Chinese. When I hear the term walled area, I think of the term Ghetto.



Lawrence Yep has written some great books that include this time period of Chinese history in the US in his Gold Mountain Chronicles.

Related Links:

• Chinatowns of the United States
• Chinese American History
• Racism Against Chinese in the United States
• Chinese Historical and Cultural Project (CHCP) in San Jose - Excellent group! The webmaster gave us a tour of their museum one time.

Related Books:

Exploring Chinatown: A Children's Guide to Chinese Culture
Our Price: $22.95
This is a book for kids, families, and teachers who’d like to get more out of their visit to Chinatown than an “I escaped Alcatraz” t-shirt or oversized pencil. It’s a guide to what makes Chinese culture, well, “Chinese.” It covers almost everything, from how to order in a restaurant, and what not to do with chopsticks, to how to write characters in Chinese and how to make potstickers. It tells about herbal medicine shops, temples, and tearooms.


Kai's Journey to Gold Mountain: An Angel Island Story by Katrina Saltonstall Currier, Illustrated by Gabhor Utomo (hardcover)
Our Price: $21.00 Sale Price: $16.95 You Save $4.05!
A journey through the Ellis Island of the West for Chinese, Angel Island, by a young boy

Angel Island Prisoner, 1922
Our Price: $11.50 Sale Price: $7.50 You Save $4.00!
A journey through the Ellis Island of the West for Chinese, Angel Island, by a young girl.

Demand Increases for Chinese

ABC News video and article - Demand Increases to Teach Chinese Language. One school that teaches Chinese has had a 300% increase in applicants. Jose Ortega Elementary school just this year started a Chinese Mandarin immersion program. The private, Chinese American International School has been around since 1981. The immersion Chinese programs I have seen in San Francisco teach Cantonese. The increase in interest on Learning Chinese is great for ChildBook. Both schools mentioned in the article are listed on my Chinese School Finder for the US and Canada specifically on the Chinese Immersion and School Language Programs page.

Strange E-Mail about Dogs in China

I just received this E-Mail and it's the first time with Childbook in ten years of running it I have ever received anything like this. I guess I am just lucky. It's interesting about what it says about some people's perception of China and, I cringe/hate to use the word, but it's Racist.

At 11:26 PM 3/7/2008
Hey; Your a sick f***! The Chinese torture and skin our cats and dogs and eat them alive. Do the research buddy!! "The way of society and how it treats its animals speaks to the core values and morals of its citizens." I;ll tell everyone about this site!! Get out of the USA -

My position on Dogs.
The person obviously does not know me. My family is a dog family. My Golden Retriever of 17 years recently passed away and that's probably why I am spending more time than I should on this E-Mail. My grandfather received many awards with his dogs and in fact died when he had a heart attack on a field trial with his dogs. My Aunt is heavily involved with Chinchilla rescues and is the family dog expert. If you live in the Bay area and want to adopt a Chinchilla, please visit http://www.cachins.org/

My Ancestry
Get out of the US to where? Parts of my family since the Gold Rush. And some of my ancestors have been in the US since before the revolution. My mother has mentioned from time to time about working on becoming a member of the daughter's of the American Revolution. This part of my family were Scot/Irish tenant farmers who gradually moved out West till they ran into the Ocean and could not go further, so they stayed in California. Another part of the family supposedly has some Indian blood in it (big family debate on this - somebody someday is going to do a DNA test and find out the truth). I am married to a person born in Taiwan, who is ethnic Chinese. So my daughter is half and half. Reminds me of a book Half And Half by Lensey Namioka about a half Scottish and Chinese Girl. My daughter wanted to respond to the E-Mail, but I told her no.

China and Dogs
Yes, some people eat Dog in China, Vietnam, and Korea. Dogs are also becoming pets in China and they are starting to have a stray animal problem. Contaminated Pet Food due to a supplier in China killed many pets in the US. I have no idea what this has to do with me. With my love of dogs, I find it repugnant people eating dogs. I was brought up as a meat and potatoes person, and I have branched out to where now I eat a little fish and shrimp (advernturesome for my family). I also eat since I married my wife a lot of Chinese food as long as I can figure out what it is I am eating - I still have memories of somebody and her cousins trying to trick me to eat frog legs in Taiwan.

Summary:

I have no idea what this E-Mail has to do with my site besides I do sell products that teach Chinese and about the Chinese Culture. China has positives and negatives, but I try to keep my blog and store politically neutral (which is why I did not write about Panda Baiting in Taiwan). My goal is giving the best customer experience possible. I hope it's another 10 years till I get another E-Mail like this.

National Chinese Conference

A conference in DC I would love to attend is the National Chinese Language Conference April 17-19th.

Topics to be covered include:

• How to make the case for Chinese in your school and community
• Bring meaningful Chinese language programs to all students
• Model your program after best practices and research
• Prepare or find highly-qualified Chinese language teachers
• Discuss other relevant topics

Time to add a Chinese Immersion Program!

It's time to add a Chinese immersion program - Newspaper editorial from a Parent in Eugene Oregon. Excellent read.

Chinese and Finnish Students - Best Practices

Some conflicting articles, both from the Wall Street Journal. One about how some Chinese students are doing so much better than US students because they get more homework. The other about What Makes Finnish Kids So Smart?

The Finnish students rank first in Science and second in Science, but they don't start school till 7 and don't have the standards that are the foundation of most improvement efforts in the US. Taiwan was first in Math as my dear Taiwanese wife likes to point out (guess who does the math tutoring at home - and it's now me). My understanding of the article is Finnish focuses on high quality teachers that are given general goals and figure out how to meet them. More Entrepreneurial, where the US Education uses in most schools a general factory set up that is standardized. Reading is a focus from an early age where parents of newborns are actually given books by the government.

The take aways from the two articles. It's an interest of mine with my daughter on how to get Good Grades, Study Skills, and get into the right College. The Finnish and Chinese approach are opposite it would seem. What was not mentioned in either article was in China, the teachers are given more time to prepare than in US classes. For learning Math, I do believe at lower levels using rote is a good method as done with the Singapore Math Texts. This gets into the entire question of why are some School better than others?

Chinese School Finder

Finding a Chinese School can be a challenge. I just updated my Chinese School Finder for the US and Canada as a customer pointed out some of the links were not working.

I have updated the links, but more importantly I have given some advice on using the search engines and google maps for finding Chinese Schools. I have also given some Chinese online phone directories.

Your feedback is appreciated!

Teaching Chinese - but we don't speak Chinese!

The challenge is parents who don't speak Chinese and want to teach their kids Chinese. So how to make it so their kids learn Chinese?

Some suggestions o