When we moved home mid-school year, one of the ideals we were most committed to was keeping the girls in a Chinese learning environment. We lucked out to move within 45 minutes of a weekend Chinese school run by a group of Chinese Americans keen on keeping their kids' Mandarin skills sharp too.
Ten days after we landed, still living in the hotel out of our ten suitcases, we went for the first session. The older girls audited a couple of classes to figure out where they should be placed. They tested too high for the Chinese as a second language classes, so they were placed in Chinese as a first language classes. MGJ was placed in 2nd grade, and EHJ in 1st. Because they were studying with first language kids most of their classmates were actually 1st and 2nd graders (with a few exceptions, they do both have a few other classmates close to their ages .... Conversely, Bei Bei, who is doing the second language track, has a range of ages in her intro class from five to 11 years.)
The mention of Weekend Chinese School was often met with moans and protests this last semester. They each had a short lesson to prepare for, with about 45 minutes of homework a week. They probably could have studied more, and we could have pushed more, but the big girls ended up with high 80% on their final exams, which isn't bad considering there was no way I could help or coach them. Their teachers would email me their lessons (in Chinese characters) I would run the email and any attachments through Google Translate, and then we would try to make out the sometimes gibberish translation that came through. Working through backwards sentence structure, they would figure out their individual assignments and work through them.
It is the policy of the school that each family spend a session or two assisting with administrative tasks and helping out in the classrooms. This helps keep their costs low, and I'm sure that the lion's share of the tuition fee goes directly to renting the large junior high facility each week. The administrators and teachers are nearly volunteers (although the teachers receive a small stipend).
At my last volunteer session, I was photocopying some lessons, and one of the heads of the school approached me, and asked how our girls like Chinese classes. (Most of the students in the weekend school are Asian, and so when our three tow heads show up in qipaos ready to study zhongwen we are sometimes as much as a curiosity here as we were in China.)
"Mai ban fa," I answered her. (Literally "there is no way out," but often used in Chinese conversation the way we might say, 'it is what it is.')
"It's not their favorite," I continued, "but we don't want them to lose five years of Chinese language skills."
She leaned forward and whispered, "My daughter hates it."
With this confession, we delved more deeply into a conversation that swirled around our desire for the best possible for our kids in the long term, while in the short term they might not see it that way. (That conversation could probably be a whole other blog post, and probably will become one.)
My daughters too sometimes hated it. About the time Amy Chua started showing up in editorials as the "Tiger Mom" (shortly after the release of her book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother), I stood in a handicapped stall of the junior high girls bathroom at Weekend Chinese School debating the merits of studying Chinese, with my oldest (then 11) who was strongly reacting against the idea of sitting all semester in desks alongside eight-year-olds.
I didn't yet have the word "tiger mom" in my vernacular, (and I'm not sure if that's what I was trying to evoke), but I reached for another image MGJ and I could both relate to.
"I'm going to go 'Korean Mom' on you here, " I said, "And tell you this is non-negotiable. I want the best for you. I understand that it's uncomfortable to be with kids younger that you, but please consider that you have just tested into Chinese as a first language."
MGJ's Korean BFF in China had taken Chinese and Violin classes outside of school, and studied every Saturday afternoon at a Korean Academy meant to keep her up to date with her Korean classmates in Seoul. Her BFF got off pretty easily, compared to many other Korean expat kids, and her mom was trying her best to let her have a childhood along with her studies.
MGJ got it. Which is not to say that every week went smoothly with The Three. One two-hour a lesson doesn't compare to the five a week that they got in China at an international school with a program that was more fresh. We don't have Mandarin swirling around us, except for the hours we spend at Chinese school on Sunday afternoons, and our occasional jaunts into Chinatown. Still, I think they have at least maintained their language level.
We finished up Chinese classes for this term last Sunday. There were trophies handed out in the first language classrooms, and medals awarded to second language students. Considering way the semester went for us, the clip of Bei Bei receiving her award, and especially her teacher's comments, brought smiles to all of our faces!
