News
Recent Media Coverage
- Educators, others push for classes to help kids learn Chinese - Detroit Free Press
- Scholarships Offered to Every Michigan High School for Online Chinese - Sys-con.com
- Preschool students to get a taste of Chinese - Record-Eagle.com
- Scholarships Offered to Every Michigan High School for Online Chinese - EarthTimes.org
- Patterson orders Chinese for Oakland County schools - Freep.com
- "These kids are really understanding the teacher. They're conversing. ... And this is preeschool. If they're immersed all the way through 12th grade, they'll have instant college and instant jobs. ... This could be the model for statewide expansion." - Michael Flanagan, State Superintendent of Schools.
- Students Learn Chinese Online - www.statenews.com
- Why China Wants You to Learn Chinese - www.csmonitor.com
CIMSU Phonecasting
The Confucius Institute recently signed an agreement with the Okemos, MI based company Konnech to offer daily 3-5 minute Mandarin lessons delivered to your phone. The phonecasts are sent based on a schedule setup by the user with an on-line interface. The service will be initially free for a limited time. Registration for the service will be available soon.
Second Life Island
The Confucius Institute is in the process of purchasing a Second Life island. Second Life is the popular virtual meeting environment with over 1.7 million registered users. CIMSU plans on developing the Second Life island to offer "do it yourself" Chinese tutorials and presentations all presented in the environment. The island will have interactive exhibits for all citizens of Second Life to explore and learn about. More information about Second Life can be found here.
Zon – The New Chengo Chinese
The new Chengo Chinese will be a massive multi-player online game, consisting of four virtual worlds: "villages", "towns", "cities" and "cosmopolitans". The four virtual worlds will progress with increasing complexity, advancing from ancient times to modern times and from countryside to cities. Those different virtual worlds represent a variety of cultures and living styles, and teach different cultural contents and language in correspondence with learners' language proficiency and cultural knowledge. Learners will start with "villages" and advance into "towns" after they grasp a certain level of Chinese language and cultural knowledge and reach a certain point. Read more about the design framework.
Online Teacher Training
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.
Please register now to receive more information about the Confucius Insititute at MSU.
