Oceania’s Mandarin teachers meet

Chinese-language educators share insights in person at Auckland conference

The Fifth Oceania Chinese Teachers’ Conference 2023 was held in Auckland, the largest city in New Zealand, earlier this month.

Over 100 Chinese-language teachers from New Zealand, Australia, and Pacific Island countries participated in the two-day conference, either in person or through online live-streaming, while attending dedicated speeches and multiple workshops.

Participating Chinese-language educators shared their experiences and insights through the sessions and explored the new environment, demands, and pedagogy of overseas

Chinese education, especially in terms of multifaceted approaches to the subject and the adoption of artificial intelligence applications, such as ChatGPT, in the post-pandemic era.

Laura Deng, chairperson of the New Zealand Chinese Language Teachers Association, said the conference was the first on-site forum of its kind since the pandemic began.

“In the past decade, there has been a growing interest in the Chinese language and culture. As Chinese-language teachers, we have an important role to play in nurturing this interest and helping our students to develop the language skills and the cultural understanding they need to succeed in an increasingly interconnected world,” said Deng.

Zhou Xuelin, director of the Confucius Institute at the University of Auckland, said schoolteachers have shown incredible abilities and intelligence to make huge achievements in Chinese-language education.

“At the 2022 National Chinese Bridge Speech Competition, students from secondary schools across New Zealand sang Chinese songs and danced Chinese dances. They performed ‘cross talk’ in Chinese and told Chinese stories using bamboo clappers,” Zhou said.

He notes that the first English-language book on Chinese cinema was authored by a New Zealander who speaks perfect Chinese, and nearly every New Zealand ambassador to China is fluent in Mandarin.

Chinese Ambassador to New Zealand Wang Xiaolong encouraged Chinese-language teachers in New Zealand and Oceania to take their students to China to experience Chinese history and culture, meet the hospitable people, deepen exchanges on the latest developments and trends in Chinese education, and cultivate more people like New Zealand-born Sinophile Rewi Alley for the new era and enhance mutual understanding and friendship between China, New Zealand and the rest of the world.

Stephanie Mortimore, project manager and facilitator from the Tui Tuia Learning Circle at the University of Auckland, an organization that offers support for foreign-language learning and teacher education, said the organization will continue to support Chinese-language teachers and teaching activities.

She said she hopes to see Chineselanguage teachers provide feedback on refreshing the New Zealand language curriculum next year.