CMI vs YY for PK3?

[Anonymous]

YY parent here and my Chinese speaking friends say that my DD mandarin is excellent. We do have tutor once per week, though.

[Anonymous]

My oldest child's spoken Chinese is reasonably good and my second child's Chinese is terrible. Both have been there since PK3 but they are different kids. Imagine that... results may be different for different kids. Mind boggling, isn't it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:YY parent here and my Chinese speaking friends say that my DD mandarin is excellent. We do have tutor once per week, though.

OK, but my husband and I (native speakers) always tell YY parents in the neighborhood that their children's Mandarin is excellent, even when it's awful. I don't think that my own kids' Chinese is excellent, and they must hear, and speak, twice as much in a given week as YY students without at least one native speaker in the home. They code mix more and more as they get older, which we don't like and struggle to stop.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My oldest child's spoken Chinese is reasonably good and my second child's Chinese is terrible. Both have been there since PK3 but they are different kids. Imagine that... results may be different for different kids. Mind boggling, isn't it?

YY has only had PK3 for one school year. How could a 3 or 4 year old learn good Chinese in a year short of immersion 24 x 7?

Any kid without special needs related to speaking can learn any language well if they hear enough of it, and are required to speak it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:YY parent here and my Chinese speaking friends say that my DD mandarin is excellent. We do have tutor once per week, though.

OK, but my husband and I (native speakers) always tell YY parents in the neighborhood that their children's Mandarin is excellent, even when it's awful. I don't think that my own kids' Chinese is excellent, and they must hear, and speak, twice as much in a given week as YY students without at least one native speaker in the home. They code mix more and more as they get older, which we don't like and struggle to stop.

LOL, so you routinely lie to your neighbors about their kids' Chinese and then come on here and snicker about it. Nice.

[Anonymous]

It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

You don't seem to get it, since you keep coming back to make your point over and over. My conclusion is that we are not tiger moms, which is not news. Your obsession with "doing it right" and worrying about high school testing for elementary students does not resonate with many American parents, who have other priorities for their kids.

You seem personally insulted by the Chinese at YY, which also seems odd. I would be thrilled if I was living in another country and met elementary students who were studying a difficult language and would never dream of calling their efforts "strange and crappy." It seems we have different concepts of "exceedingly polite."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

I have traveled to China (Beijing, Dalian, Shanghai and HK) several times, and I wouldn't call the Chinese "exceedingly polite." Quite the opposite, really--often pushy and rude. However, that's for another conversation.

That said, I don't think that it should surprise anyone that native Mandarin speakers would say nice things about your child's poor Chinese. Honestly, very few people, no matter their native tongue, will tell a parent that their child doesn't speak the non-native language very well. If the child's Mandarin, Spanish, French, etc. sucks, the native speaker will most likely say nothing (to your face) or they will lie like a rug.

[Anonymous]

NP. I'm no Asian immigrant, but if being a TIGER MOM is what it takes for American kids to really learn to speak another language, bring em on. I hear critics making logical points (only 1 or 2 rudely) and you growing defensive.

OP, hope you got the picture.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

I have traveled to China (Beijing, Dalian, Shanghai and HK) several times, and I wouldn't call the Chinese "exceedingly polite." Quite the opposite, really--often pushy and rude. However, that's for another conversation.

That said, I don't think that it should surprise anyone that native Mandarin speakers would say nice things about your child's poor Chinese. Honestly, very few people, no matter their native tongue, will tell a parent that their child doesn't speak the non-native language very well. If the child's Mandarin, Spanish, French, etc. sucks, the native speaker will most likely say nothing (to your face) or they will lie like a rug.

Yes, exactly, both for impolite Chinese and native speaking reactions to language learning outputs involving children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

You don't seem to get it, since you keep coming back to make your point over and over. My conclusion is that we are not tiger moms, which is not news. Your obsession with "doing it right" and worrying about high school testing for elementary students does not resonate with many American parents, who have other priorities for their kids.

You seem personally insulted by the Chinese at YY, which also seems odd. I would be thrilled if I was living in another country and met elementary students who were studying a difficult language and would never dream of calling their efforts "strange and crappy." It seems we have different concepts of "exceedingly polite."

It sounds like immersion charter leaders nationwide should be joining forces to lobby Congress to amend federal charter law to help their programs. No possible fix, just endless angry back and forth?

I've read that research has shown that dual-immersion works a lot better than one-way immersion in teaching children to speak languages (YY case in point). So why is Congress against the creation of dual-immersion charter schools?

I'm not being snarky. If somebody who knows about the charter movement can explain this is, please tell us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

You don't seem to get it, since you keep coming back to make your point over and over. My conclusion is that we are not tiger moms, which is not news. Your obsession with "doing it right" and worrying about high school testing for elementary students does not resonate with many American parents, who have other priorities for their kids.

You seem personally insulted by the Chinese at YY, which also seems odd. I would be thrilled if I was living in another country and met elementary students who were studying a difficult language and would never dream of calling their efforts "strange and crappy." It seems we have different concepts of "exceedingly polite."

It sounds like immersion charter leaders nationwide should be joining forces to lobby Congress to amend federal charter law to help their programs. No possible fix, just endless angry back and forth?

I've read that research has shown that dual-immersion works a lot better than one-way immersion in teaching children to speak languages (YY case in point). So why is Congress against the creation of dual-immersion charter schools?

I'm not being snarky. If somebody who knows about the charter movement can explain this is, please tell us.

The charter law that prohibits any barriers to entry is specific to DC - it has to do with each charter being able to decide to be its own LEA, which means it has to be open to all who with to enroll and can't have entrance exams and so forth. In other communities charters are part of local districts, and so they can act more like a magnet or partner with the broader district on things like vocational education or self-contained classrooms for students with more severe disabilities.

In other jurisdictions charter schools and their governance (LEAs or part of another LEA) is determined by the states (of course we are not a state in DC).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

Thankfully, I will not draw hasty conclusions about you or your children based upon a few interactions. I hope you will learn to do the same.

We get it, the YY community will never be acceptable to some native-born Chinese, to some non-native born Chinese, to some non-native born/non-Mandarin speaking Chinese, to some non-native born Cantonese speakers . . . goodness, this is a diverse group of folks and I only listed a few categories.

Get it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

I have traveled to China (Beijing, Dalian, Shanghai and HK) several times, and I wouldn't call the Chinese "exceedingly polite." Quite the opposite, really--often pushy and rude. However, that's for another conversation.

That said, I don't think that it should surprise anyone that native Mandarin speakers would say nice things about your child's poor Chinese. Honestly, very few people, no matter their native tongue, will tell a parent that their child doesn't speak the non-native language very well. If the child's Mandarin, Spanish, French, etc. sucks, the native speaker will most likely say nothing (to your face) or they will lie like a rug.

Lumping all these diverse cultures into one and calling them rude - maybe the common theme is you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's called being Chinese = exceedingly polite.

We get it, hardly anybody at YY cares that most of the kids speak strange, crappy Mandarin. Parents don't even care that the admins don't speak it. Parents think their kids are fluent if they hire a tutor and don't care how they will perform on international baccalaureate tests. Draw your own conclusions.

You don't seem to get it, since you keep coming back to make your point over and over. My conclusion is that we are not tiger moms, which is not news. Your obsession with "doing it right" and worrying about high school testing for elementary students does not resonate with many American parents, who have other priorities for their kids.

You seem personally insulted by the Chinese at YY, which also seems odd. I would be thrilled if I was living in another country and met elementary students who were studying a difficult language and would never dream of calling their efforts "strange and crappy." It seems we have different concepts of "exceedingly polite."

It sounds like immersion charter leaders nationwide should be joining forces to lobby Congress to amend federal charter law to help their programs. No possible fix, just endless angry back and forth?

I've read that research has shown that dual-immersion works a lot better than one-way immersion in teaching children to speak languages (YY case in point). So why is Congress against the creation of dual-immersion charter schools?

I'm not being snarky. If somebody who knows about the charter movement can explain this is, please tell us.

Immersion and language schools are just one of the types of charter schools in DC. When the charter movement originally started in DC, we were pushing for alternative program and options to the poorly run and horribly managed DCPS. Honestly, many of us that fought so hard in the 90s for charter programming had no idea the charter school movement in DC would turn into what it has.