By Roger McKinney
rmckinney@joplinglobe.com
GALENA, Kan. — Galena schoolchildren this summer are getting a taste of Chinese culture — and some Chinese food.
The Chinese Culture Camp is being offered to children in kindergarten through seventh grade. A federal grant is funding the project, said teacher Tamara Ballantyne, director of the project.
Qiaoshuang Xu is teaching Chinese language with games to one group of children. At the beginning of the summer session, each child introduced himself or herself to fellow classmates in Chinese.
Each child wore a T-shirt reading “education rocks in any language” in both Chinese and English.
The children in Xu’s class identified the flags of countries using the Chinese names of the countries. They also played a game with Chinese numbers.
“It’s really fun,” said Josh Buzzard, 9. “You get to learn a new language. You get to speak Chinese.”
He said he enjoyed working with puppets one day.
“You get to learn a new language,” said Daniella Clay, 8. “You get to play games, and learn countries and numbers.”
Both said they would like to visit China someday.
“You’re very, very intelligent kids, right?” Xu said at the end of one project.
In teacher Jodi Russell’s classroom, another group of children was researching giant pandas after making figurines of the endangered animals. Russell said the children this week have learned about Chinese New Year and the Chinese zodiac. Today, they will learn about the lantern festival. The Silk Road will be the topic in her class on Friday.
“The kids are just eating it up,” Russell said. “They really love it.”
Lyndsey Dixon, 8, was researching pandas on the Internet.
“It’s cool, ’cause I love pandas,” Lyndsey said. “I have a million stuffed pandas at home.”
She said she would like to visit the Great Wall someday.
“I like the activities and the food,” Lyndsey said when asked what she liked most about the week.
The pupils on Wednesday were having a snack of chicken-fried rice. Today, they will be served dumplings. They also learned how to use chopsticks.
Children in Jennifer Bingham’s classroom were decorating Chinese fans with colored sand.
“The fans are very significant in Chinese culture,” she said.
She said that earlier in the week, they made a good-luck tassel and a cloth envelope for Chinese New Year.
Bingham observed as the children worked on their fans.
“There is no way to mess this project up,” she said. “It just makes it more unique.”
“My panda bear’s not going to look right,” said one pupil. “It’s going to be pink.”
In Ballantyne’s classroom, pupils worked with a Chinese yo-yo. She also noted that the American yo-yo originated in China.
They also performed routines with a Chinese jump rope.
Ballantyne said that last week, children in kindergarten, first grade and second grade participated. This week is for third- and fourth-graders. Next week will include pupils in grades five through seven.
She said that next week, the pupils will spend the first 90 minutes of the day preparing three Chinese dishes before moving on to other activities.
Funding
The Galena School District in 2007 was awarded a three-year, $171,684 grant by the U.S. Department of Education for Chinese language classes for students in middle school and high school. Teacher Tamara Ballantyne said the Chinese Culture Camp was funded by a grant from the Department of Homeland Security.
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