Who+we+are

HOME OF THE CHINESE IMMERSION & THE NIHAO PROGRAM The Chinese programs at the MLK, Jr. School are the only Chinese language programs within Cambridge public schools. We offer two types of program models: a Foreign Language in Elementary School (FLES) model which provides all students with 45 minutes of daily Mandarin Chinese instruction from JK/K to grade 8; and a cutting edge Dual-Language Chinese Immersion program which offers 50% of instructional time in each language with the goal of developing bilingual ability in English and Chinese through a content-based academic environment. The FLES program has been part of the King School since the mid-1990s while the Dual-Language program started as an extension of the FLES program this past September. Currently, Chinese immersion is offered to two JK/K classes, and one additional grade will be addedeach year.

** Our Program Goals ** We aim to facilitate the highest qualitylearning experience in all language domains: speaking, listening, reading, writing, paralinguistic, sociolinguistic, and cross-cultural communications. It is our goal to ensure students have achievedhigh proficiency levels when they leave for higher levels of education. Our curriculum is based on the following objectives:
 * Implementing standards-based and thematically-organized curriculum across disciplines;
 * Facilitating a student-centered learning environment that promotes collaboration and critical thinking;
 * Teaching exclusively in the target language;
 * Adopting and integrating authentic materials;
 * Conducting ongoing performance-based assessment;
 * Incorporating 21st-century skills in teaching and learning.

** Chinese Literacy Development ** Students are expected to learn reading and writing from the beginning as the Chinese writing system is character-based as opposed to being based on a phonetic alphabet. In order for students to become literate in the language, we need to teach reading and writing along with speaking and listening. While written Chinese may look more complicated than written English, Chinese actually has a very logical language system where learners can develop an internal mapping ability to navigate within the language system. Learning Chinese is not difficult, but it does require the right teaching approach for learners to build a solid system.

In the Chinese immersion classrooms, students divide half of their learning times in acquiring academic knowledge through two target languages - English and Chinese. They study all academic subjects - Language Arts, Math, Science, Social Studies, and Health - in both target languages. The immersion program adopted the Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol for Two-Way Immersion Education (TWIOP) where the classroom teachers are trained in applying research-based methods and approaches in working with students to develop biliteracy and bicultural understanding. In the FLES classrooms, students are allotted 45 minutes daily in a content-supported environment that is identical to the Chinese Immersion program in terms of rigor while accounting for Chinese language development.

In both programs, students first develop solid foundations in the standard writing system in JK-3, and then begin exploring the simplified writing system from grade 3. Because of our strong belief in developing a program model that is most fitting to Chinese learners in a non-Chinese speaking environment, we will familiarize students in the Chinese writing system through radicals (root words), parts of the words, and on the word compositions. In our combined JK/K classrooms, we take into consideration the students’ developmental stages when deciding whether to emphasize side radical recognition or writing and reproducing characters independently.

Both our FLES and Immersion programs do not intend on introducing Chinese pinyin until grade 3, when we will begin learning how to type Chinese on computers. Research shows that pinyin phonetic is not helpful and may be confusing for non-Chinese speakers as the pinyin phonetic system was developed with the native speakers in mind. Research has also shown that pinyin can be a hindering factor for non-native learners of Chinese to achieve native-like fluency in Chinese speech. In addition, young learners may become overly reliant on pinyin and fail to develop the ability to decode actual written words.

Teaching Materials Our programs use a wide-variety of authentic materials in creating the most relevant learning environment. We align our units of study to Massachusetts Learning Standards in all related disciplines as well as to the National Foreign Languages standards. Some of the teaching materials include: Better Chinese series, Chinese children picture books and literature from overseas, online resources, songs, poems, and many program adopted and developed materials. For more information about what the children are learning in class, feel free to explore our Chinese teacher’s blog and wiki below: Ms. Li - Immersion JK/K classroom teacher [] Ms. Wang - FLES grade 1 to grade 4 teacher www.liwangandchinese.wikispaces.com