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Crescent students learn Chinese
By Jesse Olivarez
The Oklahoman (Oklahoma)
November 17, 2008
CRESCENT — With an eye cast toward the future, Crescent School officials hope a new program started this year will give their children the skills they need to compete in the 21st century.
The district has started an after-school program to teach first-grade students how to read and speak Chinese. Three days each week, a teacher from the University of Oklahoma comes to Crescent to teach the children basic expressions — hello, goodbye — and other familiar words such as mother and father.
Eric Wood, a first-grade teacher at Crescent Elementary, assists during the afternoon programs. Wood said the young students have picked up the language with ease.
Garrison Sullivan, 6, said he likes the courses because he gets to "learn a new language.” When asked whether learning Chinese was hard, his eyebrows furrowed as he thought about a response.
"No,” Garrison said. "It’s easy.”
Evelyn Taber, 7, momentarily couldn’t remember all the new words she had learned during the past several weeks. She eventually did remember how to say "hello, teacher” in Mandarin.
Taber also said learning Chinese "is easy.”
Superintendent Steve Shiever said the need to offer Chinese courses has steadily increased with China’s rise as a global power. Having his students learn Chinese at a young age will make it easier for them to continue studying the language as they progress through school, he said.
The classes were paid for through an $800,000 federal grant. A second grant the district received last month will give the district enough funds to expand the after-school program to students in middle school and high school.
That program will start in the coming months, school officials said.
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