中文幼儿园 - Mandarin Preschool - Bilingualism the Easy and Natural Way

The Director

My name is Joy Yao 姚韵. I received BA in China 1994 (specialising in Chinese Language teaching) and this was complimented with a Master of Applied Linguistics/Dip.Ed at the University of Newcastle.

I started learning English myself from Y7 in China - a huge amount of hard work was involved to reach a reasonable level of proficiency. After years of practical teaching Chinese in schools, it soon became obvious that starting a new language, particularly Mandarin, as late as Year 7, represents a major impediment. This applies to both teachers and students, many of whom find the entire process tedious and uninteresting. This is because the students have already passed the “golden age” of language learning. Their brains have already become “re-wired” to attain other life skills.

If children are to achieve natural fluency in a second language, it is essential for them to start early. My daughter Suyi has been listening to both Chinese and English since she was very young. Now she is bilingual and automatically knows to whom she should speak which language. Without any prompting, she translates when she is told to pass messages between the two languages. I am thrilled by my 2 year old’s language learning achievements – and she is by no means ahead of her peers in other ways. What can be achieved, with no pressure at all on the child, is truly remarkable. As a result of this experience, I have become passionate about using my skills for the 2 – 5 year old age group. At night I even dream about novel strategies for teaching!