Programs

The Mandarin Language Learning Program is an academically challenging and enriching program for developing linguistic proficiency in Mandarin Chinese and English. Students gain a bicultural experience while achieving bilingual fluency. There are many benefits:

• Bilingual students generally demonstrate great academic gains. Research shows that students in language learning programs can develop strong academic skills in addition to becoming proficient in both languages. Research shows that students receive a variety of cognitive benefits, such as greater creative thinking, mental flexibility and the ability to think abstractly.
• Students have the opportunity to achieve true bilingualism and biliteracy in Mandarin and English. Students learn languages more easily at an early age. Immersing and instructing students in the second language provides an effective vehicle for students to learn to speak, read and write proficiently in both languages by fifth grade.
• Students develop cultural literacy as well as enhanced cognitive skills. Language learning program students benefit from the ability to communicate with people from diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds.

Why immersion?

• There is a window of opportunity that occurs between birth and age 10 in which the likelihood of developing higher levels of proficiency in a second language is far greater.
• When compared to a control group of their peers receiving English instruction, bilingual students generally demonstrate greater academic gains.
• By third or fourth grade, students tend to outperform comparable monolingual students.
• Not only do students develop proficiency in the target language, they also develop increased cultural awareness. The ability to interpret cross-cultural interactions is crucial in today’s world.