From 29^th July to 9^th August 2024, Lancaster University Confucius Institute welcomed 37 children aged between 6-11 years old to the Chinese Language and Culture Summer School at Lancaster University.

The Chinese Language and Culture Summer School takes place during the summer holidays each year. The teachers work together to create a schedule for a week of exciting Chinese activities, and the week is then repeated to allow more children to have the opportunity to join the summer school at some point over a two-week period.

This year, each day started with a Chinese Mandarin language class based on the topics of greetings and self-introduction, numbers, animals, colours and parts of the body. The children learned the vocabulary through fun games and activities ensuring that all of the children participated and enjoyed the class.

Break times and lunchtimes were filled with games and activities. The children played with dragon kites, shuttlecocks, skipping ropes, drawing, listening to Chinese songs, watching Chinese videos and playing bat and ball in small groups. The children played well together and enjoyed making new friends.

Mid-morning the children had a Chinese culture session on topics such as the difference between Chinese names and Western names; lucky and unlucky numbers in Chinese culture and English culture; animals in Chinese culture and the Chinese zodiac animals, Chinese opera and festivals in China. This gave the children the opportunity to learn about Chinese culture and life in China compared to Western culture.

In the afternoon, the children enjoyed trying different Chinese arts and crafts activities. The children designed fans; did some paper-weaving and made objects such as fishes and baskets; made animals and dumplings out of clay and tried tie-dye.

For the final session each day, the children did some Chinese dancing. The dance teacher, Hui Jing, brought in some Chinese costumes and fans for the children to use whilst they were dancing. The children looked forward to the dance class each day.

Thank you to the Lancaster University Confucius Institute team and student teaching assistants for their hard work to make the Summer school a huge success.

We have received positive feedback from both parents and children, including ‘.....had a wonderful week (as always) and would very much love to return again next year. I really appreciate the work that has gone in to creating an interesting and structured week for the children’ and ‘…..LOVED it and was just so thrilled to go each day - she has already requested to go again next summer. She really thrived in the environment you created, thank you so much!’.

To find out more about the Lancaster University Confucius Institute community events, please visit: Culture - Lancaster University.