ALL HAIL THE FUTURE OF EDUCATION! Ed-tech is here to help my kids in their Chinese!

They are not hopeless! And I am hopeful! 

I am always doing the happy dance when they have Chinese lessons these days in the comfort of home, in front of a computer.

For a while now since last year, Ben and Becks have been communicating with tutors based in China weekly, thanks to Connected Learning’s offering of online Chinese tuition. This is on top of their usual weekly face to face session with our local Chinese tutor who has been with them since they were in kindergarten.

I know, kiasu, right?

BUT they need it. Their Chinese proficiency is what we figuratively say, half a pail of water, in Mandarin.

-_-

I love it that a solution using technology comes along to make things easier for busy kids and busy parents and make our lives easier and learning a little more convenient. I hear that the good local folks that started this were looking for an online alternative to make Chinese more fun and refreshing to learn. Their families spoke English primarily at home, and they felt that once a week lessons weren’t enough for their children to become fluent in Chinese (hey, that’s me too!). They wanted to expose their children to Chinese more frequently, yet this was difficult to accomplish when both parents are working full-time and are unable to send their kids to tuition so often (story of my life!).

For their creds, they have a team of 15 full-time tutors who are from China, are University graduates and/or equivalent in either Chinese Language or education-related fields. Their teachers are well-trained in online teaching to keep classes engaging and to develop a love for the language that will stand them in good stead for the rest of their lives. They adhere to the latest syllabus and exam formats as advised by MOE with the guidance of local MOE consultant teachers and have access to the Chinese textbooks and assessment books available in Singapore.

And so with Connected Learning at the convenience of our home, Ben and Becks log in weekly to to a web-based conference tool and literally take in the comfort of home to a whole new level while in “class”:

What goes on in each 60-minute lesson? Lots of conversations, questions, recapping of learned vocabulary, writing practices, new vocabulary and short video clips. They also look at papers and work on the various components assessed in Chinese from listening comprehension to sentence construction and oral. In every class, all elements of language learning 听(listening), 说(speaking), 读(reading), and 写(writing) are incorporated.

My kids started out really being extremely embarrassing whenever it was their turn to construct sentences, but they have since gotten better because they also learn in a “class” of sometimes 2 to 4 other students. The parents also get a monthly progress report from the teacher and it’s super thorough – from the mistakes they make to what they can continue to work on, the tutors are very, very detailed when it comes to that!

Also, the pricing is really affordable as well. The website features pricing for 3 times a week class (that’s intense!) but if you want a twice a week or once a week lesson package, it is definitely not exorbitant. I remember it being less than $100 for once a week for one child (P1-3), but please go ahead and enquire with them here.

I am also pleased to report that while my kids still have a long (and I mean, loooooooooooooooooong) way to go for their Chinese, their Chinese teacher at school recently complimented them for their willingness to speak up and commented that they are both speaking more as compared to the beginning of the year and their peers.

That’s good enough for me. 加油吧, 孩子!

Disclosure: We were invited to try Connected Learning for two months. All opinions here are my own, as well as our standards of Chinese proficiency.