The Students

To start off, your students have learnt a lot in the previous four Elementary courses, they have been introduced to some heavy-weight concepts already, they have crossed the first hurdle in Chinese grammar, some might still struggle in this journey, some might get more familiar and more confident. So be prepared that your class might have clear divisions of “quick” and “slow” students, or “easy-going” and “questioning” students.

We have reduced the weight of grammar in this course, so students can have time to review the first two courses. At the same time, the tricky adverbs like 就，才，再，又 etc have been summarised in this course. It’s a good overview, it’s kind of like we’ve done our job to introduce them, but it’s quite possible that your students won’t voluntarily or consciously use them.

There are only some rare occasions that you might hear students say things they have learnt: 我很早就来了。我八点才下班。我看错了汉字。我累死了。我该睡觉了。 Super satisfying, right? Don’t worry if they make mistakes, there is no need for them to be error-free.

Unfortunately, with part-time study, they just wouldn’t have the time and dedication to digest everything and practice them at other times outside of the classroom. It’s not your fault, neither is theirs. On top of that, they might have a lot of other work or social engagements going on. The once-a-week engagement with them should make them feel fun, exciting and proud, not stressed.

Again, make your class lively, not a grammar study meeting. Use the fluency practice, assessment games or other activities you design, remember 30% teacher, 70% teacher.

Students after learning this level, might again feel that they’ve learnt a lot, but haven’t got time to practice using them. Keep reminding them about the review podcasts and Quizlet flashcards. Give them the confidence that words are related, new words could be connected to old words, they will be reviewing them again and again.

Upon finishing this course, they would be a really accomplished Level 2 (in terms of knowledge introduced), their speaking might not be great, but they are likely to talk in Chinese when they can. They have also learnt a good number of basic Hanzi, they might start to read them in the Story. Make sure you show them how proud you are of them! Make sure you celebrate every bit of their success!

We use our own coursebooks for students. Make sure to read and understand all our material thoroughly before each lesson. This process will equip you with the required subject knowledge and confidence.

1) Main textbook: Level 2 Book C, Elementary 5.0 will teach Lesson 1-5, Elementary 6.0 will teach Lesson 6-10.

2) Hanzi coursebook: Hanzi Level 2 Book 3.

3) Digital material: Course Kahoot, Course Quizlet, Hanzi Quizlet, Review podcasts

Please request access to Zoho folder below:

The Materials

Fluency Main Course

Our fluency coursebook has a standard format, which includes 3 main sections – Tutorial, Fluency practice, Immersion. Each lesson has a standard format – tutorial 导入, story 读对话, comprehension 阅读理解, vocab workshop 解释新词, grammar workshop 语法学习, assessment 测试, fluency practice 口语练习, homework 作业, immersion 课后听看.

At the back of the book, there are all answers to the lesson, especially where grammar points were explained properly. Make sure to read this part beforehand, so you know how to explain to students without confusing yourself or over-explaining certain concepts.

Our sample teaching plan offers an overview of a sample lesson flow, but teachers are encouraged to treat each lesson with their own creativity and with reference to students’ needs.

• This level starts to have some more complicated grammar concepts, such as verb complements of results, which are explained and learned in several lessons across the whole book. Therefore, it is important to familiarise yourself with the whole syllabus/textbook even when you are only able to start teaching Lesson 1.
• Due to this feature, be prepared with students’ questions that might need ‘future knowledge’ to provide a satisfactory answer. Thus, signposting related forthcoming content might be helpful along the teaching journey.
• Not all native speakers always know the rules of their mother tongue. Not all linguists always know how to explain grammar in simple English. We wrote our version with very careful consideration, so it’s a good reference for you.
• Always seek opportunities to scaffold students’ learning by 1) modifying the length of sentences, grammar and vocabulary to the level that students can understand 2) encouraging them to use the newly learnt grammar structures.

Grammar

The Flow

• Prepare well and know well your teaching plan – what steps to carry out and how much time is allocated to each step? Transit to different steps naturally and smoothly.
• The format or teaching flow of each lesson does not need to be the same all the time. A diversified teaching flow is proved to work well by our experienced teachers. For instance, Fluency Practice is often used towards the end of a lesson. However, some of its activities can also be used as revision at the beginning of the next lesson. Grammar Workshop often comes after Story Time; however, it can also be learnt before Story Time to facilitate their understanding. Thus, feel free to mix and match different steps and create diversified and dynamic teaching formats.
• Make good use of our Course Kahoot and Course Quizlet games, which are proved to be useful tools to bring excitement and fun in the classroom.

• Allocate 10 – 15 minutes each lesson for Hanzi. However, as each lesson has quite a bit of content and Hanzi to cover, it is possible to leave this part as homework. Be flexible.
• Hanzi Level 2 books are designed to guide students to master the key foundational Hanzi from each lesson of their main textbook, via a selection of interactive activities, such as differentiating single component characters from compound characters, recognising characters of the same radicals or sound component, differentiating sound-alike characters, differentiating look-alike characters, etc.
• In order to explain to students why certain Hanzi is the way it is, we have written answer sheets, it’s highly recommended to read them before class! It’s possible, sometimes these explanations are hard to comprehend, you can make it light by joking “I also don’t understand why ancient Chinese people see it this way”, “these Hanzi were created so long ago, that we have put on the caveman think cap” for example. Don’t just read them out, make it fun.
• For in person class, we will print the Hanzi books for you, for online class, please encourage students to print them out, and write them with pen and paper.

Hanzi

Before & After Class

Before the first lesson

• Well prepared – material reviewed, teaching plan done, joined all of the digital resources, collected all of the books, tested your computer with screen etc.
• No need to be nervous. Remember you are equal to the students, they will be just as friendly as you can imagine.

During the first lesson 

• If it’s a new class, you don’t see all students joining your what’sapp group, please invite them verbally. You can say this to let them understand the importance of joining the group:

“Please join our class what’sapp group, it’s a study group created for us, I will be sending you learning material lesson by lesson, review podcast after each lesson, and your homework submission would be within the group too. It’s also useful when we have tech issue, or running late etc. “

• If you want to use Quizlet for your first lesson, some of your students might not have it, please instruct them. (See Quizlet section below)

After each lesson 

• Learning team will send students links and instructions to download App and material etc.
• It’s highly recommended to send students homework and the lesson Review Podcasts right after the lesson. Most students wouldn’t necessarily download the podcasts themselves, also it helps students who are absent to make up the lesson. By sending it right after the lesson, it helps the students to create a habit to listen to it. It’s proven to HELP them a lot to retain the words learnt, and listen better.

Homework 

• Since learning tasks are quite heavy in this level, homework would mostly just be assessment and sentence workshop to help students review. Some super diligent students might choose to do Writing Club. 
• We encourage students to submit their writing homework using Hanzi typing or audio speech at Elementary stage.
• Give them encouragements when they do. As teachers, you will find yourself super proud of their progress each time you hear their homework.