Students at Franklin School learn Mandarin. Formal lessons commence in Years 3 to 6.
The emphasis in the classes is to stimulate students' interest in Mandarin and to make learning a foreign language as fun, interesting and interactive as possible. Songs and games are a favourite way of introducing important core language (greetings, everyday expressions, numbers, colours, animals, likes / dislikes etc.) and traditional Chinese folk tales are an effective way of exposing students to some key elements of Chinese culture. The school is very well resourced with an excellent range of authentic realia, toys and books suitable for our students.
In Years 3 and 4 students are developing awareness of their social world and memberships of various groups, including of the Chinese class. They benefit from varied, activity-based learning which builds on their interests and capabilities and makes connections with other areas of learning.
In Years 5 and 6 students are expanding their social networks, experiences and communication repertoire in both their first language and Chinese. They continue to participate in structured, collaborative tasks that both recycle and extend language and are noticing similarities and differences between Chinese language and culture and their own.