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The Confucius Institute at Michigan State University (CI-MSU)
115 Erickson Hall
East Lansing, MI 48824
517.355.3801
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About Us
MSU Confucius Institute (CI-MSU) was established in collaboration with China Central Radio and TV University under the authorization and sponsorship of China's National Office for Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language. Its objective is to meet the ever-increasing demand for Chinese education in the U.S., providing quality Chinese learning materials and experience to both K-12 students and adults and helping training qualified teachers of Chinese.
Currently, CI-MSU is working on three major projects: podcast of existent video-based Chinese learning materials and daily news, online Chinese courses for K-12 students and adults, and Chinese instructor training program.
CI-MSU will provide podcasts of a series of video- and audio-based Chinese learning materials of both beginning-level and intermediate-level. All the materials are organized in coherent stories with language and culture explanations and are suitable to long-term systematic learning of Chinese. There will also be a series that focuses on the issues relevant to living, working and visiting China. This series can serve as a nice introduction of Chinese language and culture for those who want to prepare for their visit to China. Moreover, there will also be a series that is developed specifically for preschoolers and children. In addition to those existent materials, podcasts of adapted daily broadcasts from TV and radio stations will also be provided. Those podcast materials will be available in the coming month.
CI-MSU is collaborating with China Central Radio and TV University to develop a series of online Chinese courses for K-12 students and adults. The online high school Chinese courses will include 4 levels, ranging from beginning level till right before AP level. The online middle school Chinese courses will include two types of courses, one focusing more on Chinese language and the other more on Chinese culture. The language-oriented courses will also include 4 levels, bringing learners from beginning level to intermediate level. The Chinese culture appreciation courses will introduce middle school students to Chinese history, geography, social conventions, traditional and modern life styles, business, and many more topics. The courses can either serve as an independent course or be integrated into the existent courses like World History in current K-12 curriculum. In addition, an adult online Chinese course will also be offered. This series of online Chinese courses will all be audio- and video-based, revolving around coherent stories, with a lot of interactive activities and monitored by native speakers of Chinese instructors. The beginning level online Chinese courses at both middle-school and high-school levels are expected to be officially offered in September, 2006 and the online Chinese courses at the adult level is expected to be launched in May, 2007. Those coursework will be distributed by Michigan Virtual High School and Michigan Virtual University.
The institute will also develop a series of training materials, including online teaching training manual, Chinese teaching pedagogy, teaching in the K-12 context in the U.S., and so on. The institute will also train Chinese instructors to teach in Michigan schools, coordinate China-exchange programs for Michigan teachers and students, and provide other in-person and online programming for schools and businesses.
