Intensive Mandarin Chinese Curriculum
The program consists of four hours of daily instruction: three or four separate meetings of small, interactive classes conducted entirely in Chinese by native speakers. Only Chinese is spoken in oral drill sessions, while the native language is used to explain grammatical points and to gloss Chinese words in order to assure that the student fully comprehends the new material.
With no more than eight students per class section, you get extensive individual attention. You'll receive continuous feedback on pronunciation and grammar, and extra assistance when learning difficulties arise.
FALCON uses a variety of materials, many of them written specifically for this program. The introductory course makes extensive use of in-house materials, which include grammatical notes and exercises, dialogs for conversation practice, character tutorials, reading materials, and interactive online materials, as well as CDs for speaking and listening practice.
As students advance, the selection broadens to include films, newspaper primers, and, eventually, selections of short fiction and articles from periodicals. The full-form "classical" characters are taught first; then, simplified characters are taught for reading, so that by the end of the program, students should be adept to read both. Students also have access to University resources: libraries, museums, and films related to their own particular interests in Chinese.
Introductory Summer Level: Chinese 1160 (8 credits)
Intermediate Summer Level: Chinese 2201/2202 (8 credits)
Intermediate Level in the Fall: Chinese 2260 (16 credits)
Advanced Level in the Spring (in Beijing): Chinese 3360 (16 credits)
We teach both traditional and simplified Chinese characters,
starting with traditional characters in the summer term, then introducing
simplified in the fall term. By the end of the fall term, students are
expected to be able to read both forms. Spring FALCON in Beijing
Students attending only summer FALCON need not fear that they will miss out on simplified characters, either: a large number of the characters we teach in the summer term are the same in both traditional and simplified forms, and the vast majority of the characters that are different vary only in systematic, easily recognizable ways. We also provide a module in our summer course materials that can help students make the transition to simplified characters on their own after summer FALCON.
Learning traditional characters before learning their simplified versions is helpful for our students. Although many of our students go on to do research or work related to mainland China, where simplified characters are standard, we also have many students who have gone on to careers or research related to Taiwan or Hong Kong, where traditional characters are still the norm, or research into early modern or pre-modern China, which also requires knowledge of traditional characters. It's also much easier for students to learn traditional characters first and simplified characters second, than it is to learn the two systems in the opposite order.
Students attending only summer FALCON need not fear that they will miss out on simplified characters, either: a large number of the characters we teach in the summer term are the same in both traditional and simplified forms, and the vast majority of the characters that are different vary only in systematic, easily recognizable ways. We also provide a module in our summer course materials that can help students make the transition to simplified characters on their own after summer FALCON.
Learning traditional characters before learning their simplified versions is helpful for our students. Although many of our students go on to do research or work related to mainland China, where simplified characters are standard, we also have many students who have gone on to careers or research related to Taiwan or Hong Kong, where traditional characters are still the norm, or research into early modern or pre-modern China, which also requires knowledge of traditional characters. It's also much easier for students to learn traditional characters first and simplified characters second, than it is to learn the two systems in the opposite order.