The Mandarin character challenge

The+entrance+to+Boston+Chinatown+

Amy Traverso

The entrance to Boston Chinatown

This week Ms.Che’s classes are participating in a competition, a character challenge.

Chinese characters are used as letters to express words and phrases. For example 你好-“Hello” is broken up into two characters, 你 and then 好. The purpose of the character challenge is too broaden the students vocabulary therefore improving their speech, reading, and writing.

Students will be given one hundred characters total and will be separated into two categories, Part A and Part B. Part A will consist of 50 characters that students have already learned from previous classes. Part B will have characters that students have never learned before.

Her students are required to identify some characters by ear and others by reading. She will choose twenty random characters from part A and 10 will be for listening ten will be reading. She will choose thirty from part B fifteen will be for reading and fifteen will be from listening. The highest score you can get is 80 points.

The top five between both Mandarin classes will be rewarded with a free Dim Sum field trip to Boston Chinatown! They also will be rewarded with extra credit and homework passes. Additionally the names of the top five winners will be announced by Mr.Tracy at the end of the school day and the top ten winners will be posted in the cafeteria.

The competition will happen on April 4th. Ms.Che conveyed to all her classes, “Although the purpose of this competition is not for prizes but for having fun in reviewing and learning vocabulary, we do have something to reward those who try hard in this competition!”