华文教育海外现状：在美国教学到底难在哪儿

据美国《世界日报》报道，曾在美国南部某华文学校做过一阵代课老师的王丽(化名)，形容每周末“孩子们苦哈哈一张脸来上课，下课时高高兴兴”，令她感觉挺没劲。“说起来还是美国使用人数第三多的语言，学生也大都是华人子弟，我一直在想，为什么教学会碰到那么大困难呢？”

周末暑期班 语言环境还不够

小Q是她教过的一个学生，七岁，人聪明机灵，课前最后一分钟都要跟班上同学嘻嘻哈哈讲英文。让他念课文的结果很随机，Q妈妈在家辅导过还好，反之则结结巴巴念不顺。两岁前他会讲一点湖南话，那是外公外婆到美带外孙留下的印记。因为爸爸并不坚持在家跟他讲中文，所以小Q一直进步不快。

Q妈妈反映创造环境不容易，孩子在周末班结束不到一小时，自然而然就很少用到中文；去年暑假回中国探亲返美三天以后，讲着讲着又不习惯了。他以为自己天然讲英文的，早忘了牙牙学语时代，说的是带湖南话口音的中式英语。

小孩误会：妈妈讲的是外语？

Q妈妈是在儿子上了小学后发现他快速退步，遂送他去周末班“抢救母语”。这一番苦心，其实也正是很多应家长要求而设华语文教育机构的初衷。

在美国，外语课程一般要到中学才开设。而到了那个时候，许多华二代的母语能力也几乎退化到要以外语而视之了。在小Q眼里，都已经像是妈妈和老师让他讲一种奇怪的外语。

缩减双语课 英文真能学得快？

尽管让美国中小学生多懂一门外语的呼声渐高，但作为移民大国的美国，快速融合母语非英语新移民或本土出生学生的压力同样大。

曾在纽约市公校任数学课双语教师刘先生认为，面向全美语言最多元化的110万学生群体的纽约市教育局，在双语教育方面做得还算可以。从教育局网站可看到中文、韩文、阿拉伯文、法文、西班牙文、海地文等多语种翻译的信息。“中文双语课程现在也越来越多。”

他指出，双语教育有助大脑发育，不仅是智力发育，“双语小孩语音辨识能力强，对社会性情绪(social emotion)较敏感，会在社交能力上更胜一筹。”多掌握一门语言，对孩子将来的职业发展也有利。

290万使用者 却只是社区性方言？

要让双语学生达到两种语言能力齐头并进，刘先生坦承并不容易。现实中，一些过渡性双语项目，实施一旦有偏差，倒很可能令学生中英文能力俱损。“以为学生通过了州英语能力考试，就不必再向他们提供双语课程，这其实不公平。学生往往只是达到考试标准，未必能熟练运用。这个时候让他们离开双语课堂，结果英语也没学好，母语又流失。”

在一些“唯英语教育”立法州，可以想见学校对于英语以外语言的态度更不“宽松”。学校气氛很容易让孩子感受母语低一等，更别提树立“母语骄傲”的心态了。

作为美国第一大外语的西班牙语，情况或许比华语不止好一些。王丽说，仅一位之差，她个人明显觉得华语作为第二外语的地位要低得多。“很多美国人在学西班牙语，让它几乎被视为美国人的另一种语言。学校、电视、地铁、商店、机构自动服务语音……很多地方附有西班牙文翻译，或提供西语备选。某种程度上它已经走出西语裔社区。而华语号称有近290万使用者，在不少人眼里却好像仍只是一种新移民社区的方言。”

师资教材 与现实有些脱节

孩子们不爱学，王丽也毫不犹豫自承责任。“我这个代课老师是很随意被选上。”当年因先生去台湾工作，随行做全职太太，她给在台湾的韩国公司中层人员做过私教。“这只算是打零工，赚零花钱，而一些老师从教前甚至还没我这样的履历。”

王丽也反省不该用对外汉语的思维教华二代。“那时候我会对孩子们说，学好中文以后工作机会多哦！设计一些课文，也讲到不少中国的事情。家长倒是很支持，但孩子们兴趣了了。”后来发现，这几乎是她给韩国人设计课文一贯思路，只不过换作幼龄版。王丽是这样看法：学一门语言如果老用来讲外国的事，孩子们容易把它联想成外语；当他们习惯用华语文讲述身边的事，形容华裔孩子自己在美国生活的喜怒哀乐，就会懂得这是他们身在美国而有实际运用价值的一门语言。

“一个好的华语文教师，需要很明确自己在教谁，教的是什么。当然，第一步，学校要选对。”她认为，这样很大机会教师和教材水平会不错。

重拾幼学 华二代寻根

出生在曼哈顿下东城，有一半古巴血统的梁莺英(Ana Leon Bella)目前在华美协进社(China Institute)中文班(Heritage Chinese)学习，同学都出生在美国。大家程度不一，但都求学心切。跟在家说西班牙语的梁莺英不同，班上有的同学从小在家说华语，口语比较强；而幼年上过课的梁莺英读写能力好一些。

回忆当年，梁莺英会笑着承认，“那时候学得真不好，上课常常假装听懂。”而家人在心上埋下的一颗种子，多年后当她自愿去浇灌，种子往下扎根，新苗破土萌发。不管多难，这个在家每天要吃米饭的混血姑娘，都要把这门来自父系的语言学好。

来源：人民网

The current situation of Chinese education overseas: where is it difficult to teach in the United States

Chinese overseas Chinese network (United States "world daily")

According to the world daily report, Wang Li, a substitute teacher in a Chinese School in the south of the United States, has described that every weekend, "kids are haunting a face to class, and they are very happy when they finish class," which makes her feel boring. "Say it is still used in the United States the number of the more than 3 languages, students are mostly Chinese children, I have been thinking, why have so much difficulty in teaching?"

The language environment for the weekend summer class is not enough

Q is a student, she taught at the age of seven, who was clever, the last minute before class to class laughing about English. The result of reading the text is very random, Q mother has been coaching at home, and vice versa. Before he was two years old, he would speak a little Hunan dialect, which was the mark of the grandfather's grandmother to the grandson of the United States.  Because dad didn't insist on speaking to him at home, little Q had been making progress.

Q mother reflects the creation environment is not easy. The children end up less than an hour on the weekend class. Naturally, they seldom use Chinese. After three days last summer vacation, they talked and were not used to it. He thought that his natural speaking English, long forgotten Times said take a babbling, Hunan accent of chinglish.

Child misunderstandings: what does mother speak in a foreign language?

Q mother was in the primary school after his son found a quick retreat, and then sent him to the weekend class "rescue mother tongue". In fact, it is the original intention of many parents to set up Chinese language education institutions.

In the United States, foreign language courses are usually opened to secondary schools. By that time, the ability of many Chinese two generations of mother tongue was almost degenerated to be seen in foreign languages. In the eyes of little Q, her mother and teacher had made him speak a strange foreign language.

Can it be fast to reduce English in English?

Although the voice of American primary and secondary school students to understand one foreign language is increasing, the United States as a great emigrant country has the same pressure to quickly integrate native speakers or native born students.

He once worked as a bilingual teacher in mathematics class in New York public school. Liu believes that the New York Education Bureau, the 1 million 100 thousand most diverse group of students in the US, is able to do well in bilingual education. From the website of the Education Bureau, we can see the information of Chinese, Han Wen, Arabic, French, Spanish, Haiti and other languages. "There are more and more bilingual courses in Chinese."

He pointed out that bilingual education can help brain development, not only intelligence development, bilingual children's speech recognition ability is strong, they are more sensitive to social emotion, and they will be better at social skills. Mastering a language is also beneficial to the future career development of children.

2 million 900 thousand users are only community-based dialects?

It is not easy for Mr. Liu to admit that it is necessary for the bilingual students to reach two languages. In reality, a number of transitional bilingual projects, once the implementation of the deviation, are likely to cause the students' ability to lose both English and Chinese. "It is not fair to think that students have passed the State English proficiency test and do not have to provide them with bilingual courses. Students often only reach the test standard, and may not be able to use it skillfully. At this time, let them leave the bilingual class, the result of English is not good, the mother tongue is lost.

In some "only English education" legislations, you can imagine that the school's attitude to the language outside English is less "loose". The school atmosphere is easy to let the children feel the lower mother tongue, not to mention the "mother tongue pride" mentality.

The Spanish language, the first major foreign language in the United States, may not be better than the Chinese language. Wang Li said that only one difference, she personally felt that the Chinese language as a second foreign language is much lower. "A lot of Americans are learning Spanish, making it almost the other language of the American. School, TV, subway, shop, organization automatic service voice... A lot of places with Spanish translation, or provide alternative spanish. To some extent it has been out of the Hispanic community. The Chinese language is known to have nearly 2 million 900 thousand users, but in the eyes of many people, it seems to be still a dialect of a new immigrant community. "

Teachers' teaching materials are disjointed from reality

The children did not love to learn, and Wang Li did not hesitate to bear the responsibility. "My substitute teacher is chosen at random." When he went to work in Taiwan and as a full-time wife, she had been a private teacher in the middle level of the Korea Companies in Taiwan. "It's a little bit of a job, a zero money, and some teachers don't even have a resume like me before they teach."

Wang Li also reflected that he should not teach Chinese for two generations with the thinking of Chinese as a foreign language. "At that time, I would say to the children that we have a lot of job opportunities to learn Chinese well. The design of some texts and a lot of things in China. The parents are very supportive, but the children are interested. " It was later found that this was almost always the way she designed the text of the text for the Koreans, but only for a young version. Wang Li is such a view: to learn a foreign language if old to speak the foreign matter, children tend to think of it as a foreign language; when they used to use Chinese language about things around, describe the Chinese children themselves living in the United States will know this is the passions, they have a language and practical application in the United states.

"A good Chinese language teacher needs to be very clear about who he is teaching and what to teach. Of course, the first step is to choose the right school. " She believes that such a great opportunity for teachers and teaching materials will be good.

Picking up the two generations of young learning Chinese to seek root

Born in the Lower East city of Manhattan

Liang Yingying (Ana Leon Bella) of half Cuban origin is currently studying in the Chinese class of China Institute (Heritage Chinese) and all students are born in the United States. Everyone is different, but they are all eager to learn. Unlike Liang Yingying, who speaks Spanish at home, some of his classmates speak Mandarin at home from a young age, but their oral English is relatively strong, while those who have been in school have read and write well in Liang Yingying.

Recollection of the year, Liang Yingying will smile to admit, "that time is really bad, class often pretend to understand." But the family is in the heart planted a seed, years later when she volunteered to irrigate, Seed Germination Seedling Root, ground. No matter how difficult it is, the mixed - blood girl who has to eat rice at home every day should take this door from the paternal linguistics.