Mandarin activities for each year level

Dear Parents and Students,

We would like to keep learning Mandarin during the period of lockdown. Here is a list of activities that students of each year level can do at home. I will add materials to the post regularly. Thanks, xiexie.

Kind regards
Miss Ko

Year 2: Numbers
Number song 1 2 3 4
How to write Chinese number 1 to 10 video
Chinese number game
Practical work: Practise writing Chinese numbers 1 to 10 and make a poster.

Year 3: Fruits
Fruit song 1 2 3 4 5
Fruit market game
Practical work: Make a booklet of fruit with Mandarin names.

Year 4: Body parts
Body parts songs and dance 1 2 3 4 5
Body parts game
Practical work: Create a cartoon character and label the body parts in Mandarin.

Year 5: Hobbies
Hobbies songs & video 1 2 3 4
Practical work: Research about the favourite hobbies in China and NZ and make a Venn Diagram or make a presentation on Goggle Slides. You can research about the Mandarin names for the new hobbies.

Year 6: Sports
Sports songs and video 1 2 3 4 5 6
Sports in ancient China
Pingpong in China
Practical work: Research about the favourite sports in China and NZ and make a Venn Diagram or make a presentation on Goggle Slides. You can research about the Mandarin names for the new sports.

Other fun cultural activities
Paper cutting 1 2 3 4
Origami (Paper folding) 1 2 3 4
Taichi relaxation exercises 1 2
The little apple fitness dance

Chinese New Year Celebrations - Year of the Rat

Xin nian hao! Happy Chinese New Year!
2020 is the Year of the Rat. Children from all year levels have learned about the Chinese new year and experienced different activities. We made haobao (red packets) and learned about the meanings and blessings. Senior classes worked on their research projects in groups on Google Slides about the Lunar New Year and shared with the class. Topics include food, costumes, zodiac animals, lantern festival and new year celebrations in other Asian countries. Children also enjoyed listening to the legend stories about the Chinese New Year.
Story of Nian Video
Story of the 12 Animal Zodiac Race
Fortune Tales
Lion Dance

Mandarin Room @ New Location

Welcome to 2020!
Our new Mandarin Classroom is now situated next to the playground on the senior side. Children from Years 2 to 6 visit the Mandarin Room for the weekly classes.

Chinese Cultural Activities

Children have been exploring about the Chinese culture in Term 2.

They experienced a range of fun cultural activities such as paper-cutting, Chinese calligraphy and painting. 

Look at their awesome work! We look forward to displaying those in Term 3's art exhibition.

New Mandarin Room 2018 (Confucius Classroom)

The Confucius Classroom is now located in front of the hall on the senior campus.
This is a newly built classroom with brand new facilities such as the Interactive Smart TV and air-conditioner. Children enjoy learning Mandarin here!

Chinese Assembly 2017

Children had a great time performing in the Chinese Assembly in late Term 2. Items included songs and sharing about their Mandarin learning. It was impressive that children spoke Mandarin confidently on the stage. The highlight of the event was the Chinese handkerchief dance. It is a popular dance in the rural areas of China with a history of thousands of years. The original purpose is to celebrate harvest. 

Chinese Dance Group 2017

Asian Language Learning in Schools (ALLiS)

The Remuera and Epsom ALLiS cluster had a number of very successful cluster meetings in the previous two terms. The cluster is composed of eight schools, which included Meadowbank School, Epsom Girls Grammar School, Remuera Primary, Newmarket Primary, Cornwall Park School, Remuera Intermediate School, Parnell District School and Victoria Avenue School. All of these schools offer Mandarin and two of them offer Japanese as well. Each term the language teachers or cluster representatives get together to discuss about language teaching, learn about new teaching methodologies and enjoy various cultural activities. 

In Term one, we made dumplings and used chopsticks to eat. It was the first time to make jiǎozi for some of us.  It was a great team building activity! 

In Term two, we were pleased to have Dr Julie Zhu (ALLiS Adviser, ILEP) to teach our group about Chinese calligraphy. We learned about the history of Chinese calligraphy and different types of scripts. It was fascinating to appreciate the beautiful handcrafted calligraphy tools. We had an attempt to write the characters on the special rice paper. ​

In relation to the calligraphy activity, Dr Jiwei Fu (Chinese National Adviser) has delivered two teaching pedagogy sessions about Chinese character learning. Teachers have gained a deeper understanding about the formation of Chinese characters, radicals and the development of characters throughout the past five thousand years. 

Our knowledgeable teachers in the cluster have shared their expertise in Chinese and Japanese Tea Culture. We sampled different kinds of tea and learned about the benefits of drinking tea.  ​

By Amy Ko (Meadowbank School)