2010-11+School+Year

**Chinese Immersion Program Approved for King School** //“The Chinese Immersion program will offer great new learning opportunities for Cambridge students. I view this as the first step forward in an overall plan to strengthen our school district.” — Superintendent Jeffrey Young //
 * //Press Release //**

Cambridge MA—December 8, 2010: During the Cambridge Public School Committee regular meeting last night, members of the School Committee voted unanimously to approve the Chinese Immersion Program at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. School (100 Putnam Avenue) to start full implementation beginning September 2011. Incoming junior and senior kindergarten families will now have the option to choose this innovative program during the first cycle of kindergarten registration in January 2011.

In last night’s meeting, prospective families spoke out in support of this program citing the importance of raising a bilingual child in the 21st century to gain critical skills and competitiveness in the global economy. King School staff and teachers expressed their passion and excitement regarding this new addition to the school’s existing Mandarin Chinese Program. In his recommendation to the members of the School Committee, Superintendent Young remarked that “The Chinese Immersion program will offer great new learning opportunities for Cambridge students. I view this as the first step forward in an overall plan to strengthen our school district.”

The King Chinese Immersion Program received funding from the U.S. Department of Education’s Foreign Language Assistance Program Grant to provide resources for development and implementation over five years. The program aims to create and implement a sequential dual-language immersion Mandarin Chinese program for the King School starting from junior and senior kindergarten next year. In dual-language immersion education, students receive their daily instruction through English and Chinese. Students will maximize their learning potential by becoming proficient speakers, readers and writers of Chinese and English while realizing their potential in all of their academic subjects.

Thanks to the leadership of Superintendent Jeffrey Young, Deputy Superintendent Carolyn Turk, along with their close collaboration with Mayor David Maher, School Committee Members Fred Fantini, Richard Harding, Marc McGovern, Patty Nolan, Nancy Tauber, and Alice Turkel, Cambridge is proud to be the first public school district in New England to offer a Mandarin Chinese immersion program. City Councilor Leland Cheung also attended the meeting in support of the program. For more information about the Chinese Immersion Program at the King School, please contact King School Principal/Project Director Gerald Yung at 617-349-6962x150, gyung@cpsd.us or Project Coordinator Vivian Tam at 617-599-7258, vtam@cpsd.us.



//**Reported by a parent **// It was standing room only at the ornate Cambridge City Hall at 6 PM on December 7th (2011). In the Public Comment section which precedes official business, speaker after speaker lined up to endorse immersion teaching and to emphasize the importance of knowing foreign languages, especially Chinese, in a globalized world. They weren’t just prospec

tive parents. There was a high school student, a graduate of the MLK School, who is planning to continue learning Mandarin at university thanks to the Ni Hao program. There was a surprise appearance from the school’s former principal, Charles Stead, who admitted he had been skeptical at first about the immersion proposal but that he now believes it’s “well thought out, solid” and that to implement it would be doing what’s best for the children who attend the King School.

One of the most heartfelt testimonies came from a man who has no personal connection with China and whose children are already in the upper grades at the King School. “We speak two Mayan languages and Spanish at home,” he told the Committee. “And then two weeks ago to our surprise, our children started talking Chinese to each other!…my son said to me: ‘when I am going to learn Chinese I’m going to China!’” As this father enthusiastically put it, ‘this program is a window for young people.”

The School Committee responded in enthusiastic kind.

Expectations that December 21st was the very earliest the committee would vote on the proposal were swiftly overturned. As soon as the public comment section ended the Superintendent proposed that the committee approve the program that very evening, after hearing from Principal Gerald Yung and his team. Senior Committee m

ember Alfred Fantini went one further, moving to vote then and there before Gerald’s presentation. After some procedural wrangling, the roll call was taken and the result was unanimous – all seven committee members in favor. The audience in the hall erupted into applause, high fives and bravos.

Watch the video archive on http://www.cpsd.us/ceatv/sc_archive.htm. Mac users can download VLC to watch the video: @http://www.videolan.org/ An aticle by Marc Levy on Cambridge Day http://www.cambridgeday.com/ 2010/12/13/committee-races-to- approve-chinese-language- program/

The Planning Year. In August 2010, the MLK, Jr. (King) School, a then K-8 public school in the City of Cambridge, Massachusetts, received a grant from the Foreign Language Assistance Program in the amount of $1.5 million that spreads over a 5-year period to implement a Chinese-English dual-language program. The Ni Hao Language Immersion FLAP grant project seeks to improve and transform the existing Chinese FLES Program at the King School gradually over a five year period while continuing to provide daily Chinese FLES instruction to the classrooms. It is the intent of King School to initiate a dual language program in one strand in grades K-2, starting in 2011-12 school year, and Chinese content immersion in grades 3-4 with the purpose of eventually expanding the program after the FLAP ends to Grade 8 in 2018-2019.

The Foreign Language Assistance Program (FLAP) grant is a program by the U.S. Department of Education, Title V: Promoting Informed Parental Choice and Innovative Programs, Part D: Fund for the Improvement of Education, Subpart 9: Foreign Language Assistance Program. Its purpose is to improve the quality and extent of world language instruction, particularly in the Nation's elementary schools, by providing grants to local educational agencies (LEAs) for programs that show the promise of being continued beyond the grant period and demonstrate approaches that can be disseminated to and duplicated in other local educational authorities.

Our school has been working in consultation with Dr. Mary Cazabon (Independent Consultant from WestEd), and the China Center at the University of Massachusetts, the Applied Linguistics Department at UMass-Boston, the Center for Applied Linguistics (CAL), and in collaboration with the World Language Department in Boston Public Schools. The project calls for an annual evalutions as well as longitudinal data to guage student progress and to inform program delivery.

// Stages // The King Chinese Immersion program will follow the following stages:
 * 1) Planning phase - Sept 2010- Aug 2011
 * 2) Implementation phase - from Sept 2011
 * 3) Feedback phase - ongoing

We also hope to strengthen the existing FLES Chinese program through this grant.

= Oct 5 2010 - Press Release (English version) =

Cambridge, MA—October 5, 2010: The Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. School (located at 100 Putnam Avenue) is announcing the projected expansion of its Ni Hao (Hello!) Mandarin Chinese program to include a dual-language immersion component. Funding from the U.S. Department of Education’s Foreign Language Assistance Program (FLAP) Grant will provide resources over the next five years to create and implement a dual-immersion Mandarin Chinese program. In dual language immersion education, students receive their daily instruction conducted through English and Chinese. Students will maximize their learning potential by becomig proficient speakers, readers and writers of Chinese and English while realizing their academic potential in all of their academic subjects. Our partners in developing this program are the China Center of the Confucius Institute, Applied Linguistics Department at UMass Boston, and Learning Innovations at WestEd in Woburn, MA.

If approved by the School Committee, the dual-language Chinese immersion program will begin at the junior/senior levels of kindergarten in 2011–2012. During the current school year (2010–2011), community, parents, guardians, and school staff are invited to explore and plan with the Project Director, Gerald Yung, principal of the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. School.

There will be an Information Night at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. School on Monday, October 25, 2010 at 6:30PM. To contact Mr. Yung, please call (617) 349-6562 x150 or email gyung@cpsd.us.

= Oct 5 2010 - Press Releases (Chinese version) =

最新消息

麻省劍橋市，2010年10月5日：鄰近哈佛大學帕特南大街100號（100 Putnam Ave）的馬丁路德金博士小學宣布擴大其（Hello! )中文授課課程，計劃於明年秋季開始在幼兒園高／低班推行每天中英雙語文學習的課程，並於之後的每年增加一個年級的雙語課程. 該項目獲得美國教育部的外語 援助計劃提供資金贊助，將在未來五年內逐漸加入並鞏固中英雙語浸入式課程. 學生將能沉浸在雙語文教育的學習環境里，接受以英語和漢語為主的教育. 該計劃的 宗旨是讓學生最大限度地發揮學習潛能，使學生們在中英語言學習上邁進的同時，能運用雙語精通其他的學科. 這一方案的合作夥伴是孔子學院，麻省大學波士頓分 校的應用語言學系和位於Woburn的WestEd教育研究智庫.

如獲校區委員會批准，該校將在2011－2012年度開始舉行雙語授課. 在本學年（2010-2011）中，以校長杰拉爾. 容為首的項目負責人，會致力與社區，家長，監護人和學校的工作人員探討和則畫最完善的推展方案.

本計劃誠意邀請家長和社區人士參加我們在2010年10月25日晚6點30分舉行的諮詢聚會. 地點為馬丁路德金博士小學（Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. School, 100 Putnam Avenue). 容校長已安排校方職員在當晚提供托兒服務，使帶有年幼小孩的家庭也能輕鬆前來聚會. 如有疑問，請致電（617）349-6562 x150或電子郵件 chineseimmersion.cambridge@gmail.com.

=News Coverage=

Cambridge Day, October 10, 2010

[|"Eye on the future - MLK seeks to be Chinese language immersion school"]

Cambridge Chronicle, October 12, 2010

[|"A Cambridge school will be one of the first in Massachusetts to offer a dual-language immersion program in Mandarin Chinese as early as next year."]

[|We are featured on the Mandarin Immersion Parents Council]