Reply to Yu Ying - Do/Can Non-Native Kids Actually SPEAK Chinese?

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[quote=Anonymous]Single Parent of a current YY 5th grader here. Most on this board would consider me low SES even though the legal threshold for low SES is approx 5K lower than my income and household size ratio. We live frugally and minimally, east of Rock Creek Park.

Informally, I'd say that many parents fall within 5-20K of the threshold for low SES... but thats hard to truly verify.

I invested early in Mandarin tutoring, and only oral language and conversation, as that is the kind of practice and proficiency I wanted for my elementary-aged kid.  I am not a native speaker and don't speak Mandarin.

In grades 1-3, I used an online site to hire college students from GW and other native speakers to meet with my kid have 45 minute conversations twice weekly for exposure. I also joined a few playgroups early where my kid was integrated with kids of native speakers (in VA), went to events where Mandarin would be spoken, and consistently encouraged the exposure outside of school.  It wasn't that expensive, but it was a choice that not every family is willing to commit to.

Exposure outside of school makes a huge difference when the parent isn't a native speaker and the school is pretty clear about that from the start.  Kids get potentially 90 school days in Mandarin, not accounting for fields trips, subs, and sick days. Also the kid needs to buy-in and actually wanting to learn the language...

The current fifth grade was huge, they were the guinea pigs for a lot of strategies and logistics issues. The parents that made the time effort to supplement early have seen it pay off in the upper grades.

I wouldn't trust any the analysis on DCUM, different classes of fifth graders faced very different circumstances, which for charters is pretty much par for the course.[/quote]

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