Read articles written about Bilingual Buds.
Diversity as Normal as Speaking Chinese
NY Times
By MICHAEL WINERIP
Published: October 7, 2007
SUMMIT, N.J. At the ripe old age of 3, Sidney Kinsale is in her second year of learning two foreign languages. She attends a preschool here on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays where she learns Chinese. Then on Fridays, she goes to a second preschool in Scotch Plains where she learns Spanish.
“I’m not sure she’ll totally get it all,” says her mother, Carlene, whose college degree is in early childhood studies. “But our hope is she’ll have a love for language and continue Mandarin and Spanish until she’s fluent.”
The Kinsales are not alone. The Mandarin preschool here, Bilingual Buds, has grown to 110 students from 10 in three years.
Read more here.
Non-Asians Show a Growing Interest in Chinese Courses
NY Times
Published: November 29, 2006
SAN FRANCISCO — With its booming economy and aspirations to expand its global influence, China may have achieved a victory in American classrooms.
Take the private Chinese-American International School here, which runs from prekindergarten through eighth grade and offers instruction in all subjects — from math to music — half in Mandarin and half in English. The curriculum also includes Chinese history, culture and language studies, and in the 25 years since the school was founded, it has attracted mainly Asian-American children. But in the past few years, it has seen rapid growth in the enrollment of non-Asians.
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Parents Take Language Class Into Their Own Hands
NY Times
By WINNIE HU
Published: September 30, 2006
LIVINGSTON, N.J. — In the back of an Armenian church here, 2- and 3-year-olds sing along to the classic nursery tune “Frère Jacques” — but this version is in Mandarin Chinese: Ni hao ma, Ni hao ma, Wo hen hao, Wo hen hao (“How are you? I’m very well.”). Afterward, they practice counting and snack on bananas, all without speaking English.
Five days a week, these toddlers attend Bilingual Buds, a Chinese-immersion preschool, where neatly printed Chinese labels are posted on everything from class bulletin boards to the bathroom sink so that parents can understand basic words.
Read more here.
