Study Mandarin in China: Language Schools across China Open Their Doors to Foreign Students

Mandarin, or Putonghua (common speech), is the official language of the People’s Republic of China. With around 867,000,000 native speakers, it is the most spoken language in the world. It is also attracting an increasing number of foreign students, eager to study Mandarin in China. China’s state news agency Xinhua reported in October 2008 that China’s higher international status in recent years has made the Chinese language more attractive to foreigners. “The number of foreigners studying Mandarin is claimed to exceed 30 million,” according to the report. ("'Education for all' effort fruitful after 30 years", 9 October 2008).

Study Mandarin in China

The notorious difficulty of Mandarin, a tonal language, means that some time spent learning the language in a Chinese language environment is a great benefit. This is easy to arrange as there are a large number of language schools catering to foreigners across China.

Language Schools in China

A number of companies specialize in organizing language learning courses around the world. Language Courses Abroad (LCA) is just one of many such companies, arranging language courses everywhere from France to Egypt. Their Chinese courses take place in Beijing, Shanghai and Qingdao. In contrast, other organizations such as China Study Abroad (CSA) focus solely on China, offering a range of programs across the country.

For those wishing to take the independent route, there are a bewildering number of language schools to choose from. The following is just a small selection.

Beijing

Academy of Chinese Language Studies provides a range of courses aimed at beginners to advanced learners. Courses last from a few weeks to an academic year.

The main campus is at: Lead International Building 4th Floor, No 2A Wang Jing Zhong Huan Nan Lu, Chaoyang District, Beijing, P. R. China, 100102 Phone: +86(10) 8472 1653 Fax: +86 (10) 8472 1285 Email: info@acls.com.cn.

Shanghai

The Mandarinshanghai Language Center runs language schools in Shanghai and Suzhou. They offer a variety of courses, including business Chinese and the local Shanhainese dialect. They can be contacted via their website at www.mandarinshanghai.cn.

Mandarin House runs Chinese language schools in both Beijing and Shanghai. The school in Shanghai has five different learning centers across the city offering courses at a range of levels. They can be contacted via their website (mandarinhouse.cn) and at info@mandarinhouse.cn.

Hong Kong

While Hong Kong is predominantly Cantonese speaking, Mandarin has increased in popularity since the handover of Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. Many language schools have added Mandarin classes to their schedules in recent years in response to demand. The drawback is that there is less opportunity to practice outside of class.

Q Language, 14/F Wing On Cheong Building, 5 Wing Lok Street,Central, Hong Kong, Tel: (852) 2540 0552, Fax: (852) 2540 9529, Email: info@qlanguage.com.hk.

Kunming

Keats School provides one-to-one instruction. Address: 84 Dongfeng Dong Lu (Dongfeng East Road),16th Fl. Room C, Guolian Building,Kunming Municipality, Yunnan Province, China Email: zierliu@cnlearnchinese.com and keatsschool@yahoo.com.

Many schools supplement the study of Mandarin Chinese with additional classes in other aspects of Chinese culture, such as martial arts, calligraphy and Chinese cooking.

Studying Mandarin in China is a rewarding experience, enabling the student to learn about both Chinese culture and an admittedly very difficult language. Students find that being surrounded by the language for a period of time is beneficial.

Feb 25, 2009 8:25 AM

Guest :

I studied for one month at Mandarin House in Beijing during Jan 2009. The staff and teachers were friendly at first. I and many of the other students felt cheated because although we each paid a lot of money for their so called "intensive 30" and "intensive 20" immersion course but instead because the school was not busy during the winter months they cut back the classes from their advertised 1hr per class to just 30 minutes class.

I was told that there were 4 people going to be in my class. There terms and conditions when we all signed up said that they can reduce do this if there are less than 2 people per class (ie just one person) , and when we arrived we were given copies of the terms which also said this. BUT then they said "sorry this is a mistake" and that the rules had changed for 2009 and that if there are less than 3 people per class then the class time would be only 30 min per class. We all started to complain (there were 3 classes with just 2 people) and were told some bulls..t story that we can learn the same in the shorter time, and some of us were offered a free text book as some sort of good will jesture. This was some sort of joke as the teachers had to push us through the lessons so they could finish the course books on time and the student were given a lot of homework to make up for lack of lesson time.

I personally paid for 30 hours per week and got just 15 hours. The staff at Mandarin House stopped talking to us because they new we were upset and the teachers were getting pushy and didn't want to take up time to explain things. We find out also that they charge way too much for their text book and for the accommodation. If you want to study in Mandarin in China, do you research very carefully and don't lock yourself in by paying everything up front. I found other private tutor after saying goodbye to Mandarin House for much less than their group classes. Good Luck!

Jun 19, 2009 3:28 AM

Guest :

I have been staying in china for many years, and I know that the main chinese language school in china are in big cities such as Beijing, Shanghai Hongkong and Hangzhou.
I have went to two schools here, one is Mandarin House in Beijing and the other is mandarincapital.cn in Hangzhou. I think the schools are both very good.
I have not went to study my chinese in other school but I think the best place for we to study chinese in china are these places.
The climates are very different in these cities, so if you want to leanr chinese, I suggest that you'd better try to know more about the weather you may like in china.