Learning to speak Chinese

Ariana Koers, Mandarin Chinese teacher, shows her Rio Rancho High students, including Tyler Talley, right, how to hold a calligraphy brush during class. (Marla Brose/Albuquerque Journal)

When students walk in to the Rio Rancho classroom of Ariana Koers, they are greeted with “ni hao” instead of “hello” and Chinese music drifting from the speakers of the classroom radio.

The opportunity to learn Chinese at the high school level, Koers said, might be unexpected in a New Mexico classroom, but it’s useful into today’s growing global economy. Mandarin Chinese is the most spoken language in the world, with more than a billion people speaking it.

Rio Rancho High principal Richard VonAncken said schools are aware that China has become an economic powerhouse and that interested students should be exposed to the language. The challenge, he said, is finding a teacher who is adept enough to teach it.

“We are fortunate enough to have that teacher,” he said. “Most high schools provide Spanish, German or French. But to provide Chinese is unique.”

Even Albuquerque Public Schools, New Mexico’s largest district with 13 high schools, offers a Chinese language course only at its Career Enrichment Center, which provides enrichment courses to students districtwide. Spokesman Rigo Chavez agreed that one of the greatest challenges is finding a teacher for the course.

Koers teaches Chinese at both RRHS and V. Sue Cleveland High. She grew up in Santa Fe and Taos but went to a California college and participated in an exchange program that took her to China for the first time. She hadn’t taken a single semester of Chinese to that point.

“I came home and told my roommate ‘Wait. If I’m moving to China, I might have to actually learn to speak Chinese,’” she said. “He laughed at me.”

Koers lived in Xi’an in 1997 for a year, becoming a fluent speaker but unable to write or read the language. She returned to the United States and was determined to also read and write Chinese, which eventually she was able to do. She lived in China two other times – in Zibo in 2000 and Beijing in 2002, for a year each – and has visited at least half a dozen more times, helping to keep her skills sharp.

She’s been teaching Chinese in the school district for six years. In conducting a recent class, Koers begins to skillfully speak in Chinese, switching to English every few sentences and then back to Chinese. Some of her 20 students reply in Chinese.

One of those was freshman Lindsay Anders, who started learning Chinese in sixth-grade at a charter school she attended. She said in seventh-grade she became friends with a girl who had moved to Rio Rancho from China. The girl didn’t speak any English and it gave Anders a chance to practice. Her family also provided a private tutor for her.

“I can understand it quite a bit,” she said. “My dad is taking me to China in about a year.”

In today’s class, students practice calligraphy. Koers passes out sheets of paper with 24 squares each for students to write the character that means forever.

“Hold the brush like this,” she says. “This takes years of practice. Take your time. Remember the video. ‘Slowly. Slowly.’”

One student in her class, 10th-grader Christian Apolonio, tells Koers jokes about his terrible calligraphy skills.

“This looks so bad,” he says. “It’s not even funny. I’m seriously not doing this right.”

But he keeps trying and says despite the challenging nature, he likes the class. This is his second year with Koers, and he said he can speak some and understand more.

“Everybody does Spanish,” he said. “Nobody thinks ‘Oh, I’ll take Chinese.’ I wanted to do something different.”

Sophomore Luis Conejo was more practical about his reasons for enrolling in the class.

“I already speak Spanish,” he said. “China has a growing global economy. I thought it would be useful and cool to learn Chinese.”

Koers will participate in a six-week Associated Colleges in China Intensive Language and Culture program in Beijing this summer. She said a scholarship pays for her flight and room and board. The program instructs teachers on how to successfully teach Chinese.

“The exciting thing is we have to take a pact to speak only Chinese while we are there,” she said. “China is also changing so fast. It will give me an opportunity to see what is new.”
See LEARNING on PAGE 3Marla Brose/Journal

Timothy Weber, a sophomore at Rio Rancho High, practices calligraphy in his Mandarin Chinese class. He’s practicing the Chinese character that means “forever.”
— This article appeared on page 06 of the Albuquerque Journal