Family summer program

We are visiting Beijing for 2 weeks with our 3 kids aged 13, 11 and 9. We are coming from California. We searched online for summer camps to learn Mandarin. Many people in America and China ask us “Why?” and the answer is: a) we wanted an adventure together as a family, and b) we believe Mandarin is the most important language for our kids to learn at school, so we wanted an introduction to the language so that our kids are not afraid to continue learning.

- Location: great, we are staying in an apartment nearby, and we like being in a normal neighborhood to experience normal Chinese life.

-Teachers: laoshi hen fei cheng hao! Really excellent. We have been very impressed with the quality of the teaching. We like the conversational style, the content is very relevant to our activities in Beijing - eating, travel， shopping, meeting people. We have really enjoyed getting to know Chu and Cai and hope to stay in touch on WeChat. The kids are happy, they enjoy learning Mandarin words and all their teachers look very kind and patient. Ruby (9) struggled a bit with the homework - she is okay with speaking and listening but the written symbols and pinyin was harder than she was expecting.

-Safety: all good.

-Food: the kids liked the pizza of course, and trying some Chinese foods.

-Activities: the kids liked the trips to the Heaven Temple and Science Museum. The late change from the Zoo to the Silk Market was a surprise - if we knew the kids were going to the market we could have spent some time with them before teaching them how to barter / get a good price!

We had already been to the Silk Market and the Water Cube last week on our own, it would have been useful to know the school itinerary in advance so we would not need to go twice! We think they would prefer the Zoo to the Water Cube. Support from Holly was fantastic！

We took classes so we could share the experience with the kids. And we can help each other. And language is a fantastic way to understand Chinese people and Chinese culture.