Wilson students broaden horizons with Chinese culture

FLORENCE — Twenty Wilson High School students are spending three weeks of their summer broadening their horizons by learning about the Chinese culture through the school’s first summer Chinese camp.

Dr. Lucia Huang, who originally is from Taiwan, is the instructor for the summer Chinese course called “Splash into Chinese.” Huang is certified in the Chinese and German languages.

The camp, which began July 14 and ends Friday, introduces students to an intensive three-week language course in Mandarin Chinese. Participating students receive one credit hour.

MULTIMEDIA

For three weeks in July, a group of students attended the "Splash Into Chinese" camp at Wilson High School in Florence. On Monday, July 21, 2008, the students learned the basics of Chinese cooking and participated in "Iron Chef: Wilson" with five groups competing against each other. Click here to catch a glimpse from the kitchen through the lens of Morning News photojournalist Angela Kershner.

Huang used language teaching strategies to teach students how to read, write, speak and understand Chinese, and build an appreciation for the Chinese culture through such daily activities as Chinese calligraphy lessons, Chinese games and songs, and listening and reading exercises.

On Monday, the students participated in their very own “Iron Chef” competition where students learned how to make lo mein. The students’ dishes were judged based on color, aroma and taste.
On Thursday, the students will leave Florence for a trip to Washington, D.C., where they will visit several sites, including a museum and Chinatown.

By participating in the course, Huang said, she has found students have gained a better understanding of the Chinese culture. She said she was happy to see that the students were able to learn some basic aspects of the language in a short amount of time.

“A lot of people think Chinese is a difficult language, (when) it’s not,” Huang said. “The characters may be different from the Western alphabet, but the grammar structure is not as strict as Spanish or German.

“This group picked (the language) right up,” she said. “I’m so proud of them.”

Dante Fercana, 16, said he participated in the camp in hopes of gaining some experience he could use when pursuing a degree in international business.

“I thought it would be good for my career,” Dante said. “I thought about going into international business ... German and Chinese are pretty good (languages to learn).”

Fercana also studies the German language with Huang during the school year.

Both Fercana and Cherielle Walker, 17, said they would recommend the camp to any of their peers if it was offered next summer.

Cherielle said she enjoyed learning “something new” and found writing in Chinese calligraphy was easier than trying to speak the language, but had fun nonetheless.

Wilson’s foreign language program includes French, German, Latin and Spanish, and the Chinese summer camp is the first offering of its kind at the school.

Wilson was able to offer students a lesson in Chinese culture, through a $25,370 STARTALK grant from the National Foreign Language Center at the University of Maryland. The school is the only individual high school in the state to receive the award.

On the Web
Wilson High School, www.fsd1.org/wilson
STARTALK, http://startalk.umd.edu