2nd Week (2/14-2/17) Chinese New Year (Section 2)
Hah! This week is eventful!
We continue with our Chinese New Year “celebration” with Valentine’s Day kicking off the first day of the week 
Children were in sugar high but I received my very first V-day card from Jackson Friday, so sweet! Thank you! To echo this special loving holiday, I taught the children to express their love and affection to family members or whatever they care about. The sentence structure they used is”我（wo，3）爱 （ai，4）。。。” (“I love…”). They could complete the sentence by saying “爸爸（ba 4 ba)” [father/daddy], “妈妈 (ma 1 ma)”[Mother/mommy] , “哥哥 (ge 1 ge)” [older brother], “姐姐 (jie 3 jie)” [older ister], “弟弟 (di 4 di)” [younger brother] “妹妹 (mei 4 mei)” [younger sister], “我的猫 (wo 3 de mao 1)” [my cat], “我的狗 (wo 3 de gou 3)“ [my dog], or even “我自己 (wo 3 zi 4 ji 3)” [myself]. Beside, they are try to follow me to do origami of paper heart. See the following link for reference:
http://www.wikihow.com/Make-an-Origami-Heart
It was not easy but I was glad to see that they all tried hard and a couple of children who finished earlier volunteered to help others. This is how Valentines Day matters to us!
Tuesday, due to a mandatary training, teacher Daisy subbed me. I sent out detailed class schedule to her. She is a very vivid story teller. I left a very good illustration book about the original of Nian (年，Chinese New Year) for her to tell the children. Feel free to get some idea of the story from the following link:
http://resources.echineselearning.com/general/general-chinese-1239.html
You may also practice reading some key words on this website where their phonetics (Pinyin) were noted and even with audio.
On Wednesday, we follow up with the story told on Tuesday as well as checking previous worksheet. Children learned to say “春 （chun 1, spring)” which is part of “春节 （ chun 4 jie 2) [Chinese New Year]” and a couple of popular greetings during Chinese New Year like “大吉大利 (da 4 ji 2 da 4 li 4)” [Good Luck and Forturn] and “平平安安 （ping 2 ping 2 an 1 an 1）” [Safe and Tranquility]. BTW, I was very glad to meet Baxter for the first time on Wednesday this semester. He has some Mandarin foundation so I assigned him to be seated with four other advance communication/literacy level students.
Also, in the evening, I had a very meaningful parent meeting together with Alice explaining Mandarin class students grouping, class structure, class discipline and parents expectations. The minute of the meeting was sent out by Alice through email system. I appreciate all parents’ participation and suggestions. They are very constructional to my teaching！Xiexie！
On Thursday, considering Chinese New Year is going to close, and we are still expecting the last big day of the whole celebration period – “元宵节” （yuan 2 xiao 1 jie 2）［Chinese Lantern Festival], I read a story about the origin of the story. This story also tells about one of the most important traditions on this holiday - 吃元宵 （chi 1 yuan 2 xiao 1） [eat glutinous rice ball]
Last but not least, they were all excited and enjoying making paper Lantern (灯笼 deng 1 long 2)
Here’s a good link to follow:
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/crafts/chinesenewyear/lantern/
I am glad all the children were able to finish or did their best to complete all the worksheets in class. A couple of the children were not that shy like before and speak Mandarin louder. Also, another few of them enjoyed writing the first twelve numbers in Chinese and had a pretest. I plan to test all of the students next Tuesday when school is reopen after the President’s Day long weekend.
Happy Holiday and be proud of your kids~
Zaijian! 再见！ See you later!
