This morning, my helper pointed out an article in yesterday's paper, which I hadn't had the time to read yet. It was about programmes for kids to teach them Mandarin, to be newly aired on Nick Jr today. She says my son likes the character Kai-Lan.
So at 10.30am today, I switched on Nick Jr and watched it with him. He does indeed like it. The lead character, Kai Lan is cute & loveable. I liked how they incorporated various things into just one episode:
- introduced chinese culture (today was on dragonboat festival);
- "interactive" (he got up & joined in when they invited him to do the dance);
- introduced bits of mandarin similar to the way Dora teaches Spanish to English speakers;
- showed what kids should do when they're angry;
- friends help each other
- taught that it's ok to lose & you should try again.
The bits of Mandarin they taught today:
- Ni hao = hello, which will be recurring given it's the title of the cartoon
- Ye ye = grandfather, who from what I read, is a regular character in the cartoon
- counting 1, 2, 3 in Mandarin (my husband has taught him to count to 10 in Mandarin)
- Tiao = jump
- goodbye in mandarin (I dont know how to spell it...maybe it's "jai jian")
- other bits were said quite fast e.g. ne tiao tao hen hao = you jumped very well
I'm glad that there's finally a good quality cartoon to teach Mandarin. I'm such a "banana" that I can't teach Mandarin to my son. It's good timing too cos he's within the show's target age group.
It's being aired on Nick Jr, Astro Channel 612, weekdays at 10.30am.
There are other Mandarin shows & Mandarin dubbed shows of popular cartoons like Dora showing on Nick Jr too. For details:
http://www.star-ecentral.com/news/story.asp?file=/2009/9/13/tvnradio/4685104&sec=tvnradio
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