A scene from the film being made by the Education Division, showing a Mandarin teacher from Taiwan at an elementary school, conducting a “repeat after me” activity

Taiwan offers world-class Mandarin language teaching and Taiwan’s Ministry of Education sponsors the Taiwan Visiting Mandarin Lecturer/Teaching Assistant Program. As its name suggests, this is a program that arranges and provides subsidies, for qualified language teachers from Taiwan to work as teachers and language teachers at overseas educational institutions.

There continues to be a growing demand for Chinese language programs and qualified teachers, so for the past few months, the Education Division of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the U.S. has been making a film introducing the Taiwan Visiting Mandarin Lecturer/Teaching Assistant Program, and Mandarin learning resources that universities, schools, and individuals can utilize.

Three visiting teachers from Taiwan who teach Mandarin in the US were invited to take part in the film-making project: Ms. Hsu Shu-Ting, who teaches at Duke University, Ms. Tsai Hsing-Fang, who teaches at Western Kentucky University, and Ms. Lu Jin-Hua, who teaches at Old State Elementary School in Delaware. Some of their students talk in the film about their experiences learning Mandarin and Chinese characters. For example, two Duke University students talk about why learning Chinese is special, saying that learning Chinese is very empowering, unlike learning the other languages commonly offered at the campus, and they described it as an incredible opportunity. One of the elementary students said she finds learning Mandarin really enjoyable because her teacher is so encouraging.

At the end of the film, the Education Division also gives details of online learning resources developed by the Ministry of Education and National Taiwan University. One is Learning Chinese: Start from Scratch, a six-week introductory course in Mandarin conversation that focuses on basic communication. The other is Who is Speaking: Lovely Taiwan, an intermediate level Mandarin course material that features grammar, pattern practices, and text comprehension. These online courses are both free and easy to access at any time.
The film is scheduled to be released on the Facebook page of TECRO in the US in September, after final editing and post-production.