Tasks and Activities

Family: Parents’ Love and Understanding

Task 1: Culture Exposure and Practice

Brief Introduction:

Task 1 provides students with cultural knowledge by introducing a famous Chinese idiom story that reflects traditional Chinese conceptions of children’s education. Through a series of cultural learning activities, students familiarize themselves with the idiom and its cultural context. Careful analysis of the idiom helps students better understand prevalent beliefs and practices regarding parenting and education in China.

Learning Chinese idiom “望子成龙” 

Step 1. Conduct an online research for the story behind the idiom.

  • Share the findings in class
  • Analyze the meaning of its characters and deep meaning of the idiom
  • Discuss the following questions:
  1. Why is this idiom related to the dragon?
  2. Explain the meaning of the idiom and discuss its significance in Chinese culture.

Step 2. Watch the video on the famous Chinese historical story《孟母三迁》 and practice

看孟母教子的视频 《孟母三迁》

Exercises: Group sharing and discussion

  1. Vocabulary learning, create a glossary
  2. Briefly Narrate the story in the video
  3. What are the different hopes and demands of Chinese parents and American parents for their children? Why?

Writing Assignment

  1. Write a story about your childhood (about 500 characters).
  2. Get feedback from ChatGPT on your first draft, then revise it.
  3. Make a recording of your story and then share it with two other students in a group.
  4. Provide feedback on your peers’ stories regarding content, clarity, engagement and articulation.
  5. Get feedback from Instructor.

Task 2. Project-based & Community-based Learning

Brief Introduction:

This task focuses on situated practice. Students watch mini videos after class to learn more about contemporary social issues in China, particularly regarding the relation between parents and their children. Students are then asked to apply what they have learned in this unit to real-life situations through various learning tasks and projects. These tasks encourage heritage learners to make use of their heritage background knowledge to engage in intercultural comparisons and to reflect upon relevant points of contrast.

Part I Language & Cultural Learning 

Step 1. Watch a mini video “Daughter” 《女儿》

 

Step 2. Online Entries

  • Vocabulary expansion: enter the unfamiliar and unknown words/ expressions/cultural elements selected from the video material in a table online.  
  •  Provide Pinyin, meanings and a couple of example phrases or sentence. (Use AI tools)
  • Vocabulary reinforcement exercises.

Step 3. Complete the questionnaire to understand the content and actively engage in critical thinking and online discussions.

  • Where did the story take place?
  • What are the ages of the people?
  • How are the characters related?
  • Describe the living condition
  • What problems are they facing?
  • What causes these problems?

  • Who should responsible for these problems? Why?

  • In your opinion, what are the best ways to these problems?

Step 4. Homework: Online Discussion in groups (Cross-cultural analysis and discussions)

  • Share questionnaire responses by comparing and contrasting the facts (in China and other countries), different life experiences, and point views Provide comments on each other
  • Write a short summary and own reflection
  • Share group analysis/ summary/ reflection of the online discussions in class

Part II Transformed Practice – Project

Step 1. Knowledge application: Interview

Student create a personal research project on a topic associated with the cultural themes they discussed.

  • (Homework to prepare the interviews) Each student prepares three thoughtful questions in Chinese.
  • Students share questions with each other and get help with articulation, vocabulary, grammatical accuracy, etc.
  • Two students in a group together interview native Chinese speakers on campus or their parent.

Step 2. In class presentation

  • Students share their findings from the interviews.
  • Students share their reflections and insights on the media material and the interview.
  • Listeners provide questions for discussions.

Step 3. Writing Assignment

  • Write a journal on “Your Chinese & American Life Story”
    • Make a video
    • Share the videos in class

 

Family © 2024 by Peisong Xu is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

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