Thanksgiving vs. Chinese Lidong Festival

Thanksgiving, the holiday in North America celebrating the harvest of the past year, is a time to gather with family and friends to give thanks and blessings. In China, there is also a special festival that people celebrate in November. It is called “立冬 (Lidong)“.

The traditional Chinese calendar, also known as Lunar Calendar, divides a year into 24 solar terms. Lidong, the 19th solar term, usually begins around November 7 and ends around November 22. The first day of Lidong indicates the beginning of winter.

How do Chinese celebrate Lidong? Similar to Thanksgiving, Chinese people would express gratitude for a good year and have a big dinner too! The most popular dish for Lidong is dumplings, “饺子 (jiaozi)“.

Fun Fact: Since the shape of a dumpling looks very much like an ear, it was believed that by eating dumplings during Lidong, one could prevent their ears from frostbite during the cold winter coming. This tradition is still followed today. Well, maybe consider preparing dumplings with your turkey this Thanksgiving? 🙂

We, previously known as NiHao Chinese, also had a fruitful year. Since November, our new brand Preplingo(preplingo.com) has officially launched to replace NiHao Chinese! We are still focused on Mandarin. The new name carries our hope to prepare young generations to a future where multi-language is an important and necessary skill set to have. We couldn’t get this far without you, and we are so grateful.

Winter is here. We hope you all have a wonderful holiday season with your family. Thank you for your support in the past year, and Happy Thanksgiving!

5 reasons why learning Mandarin Chinese is important

Statistics from the American Councils for International Education show the number of students learning Mandarin Chinese at primary and middle schools in the U.S. doubled between 2009 and 2015.

What makes Mandarin Chinese so popular? Here are our top 5 interesting findings and figures to share with you.

1. Speak to the world

One of the six official languages of the United Nations, Mandarin Chinese is spoken by over 955 million native speakers worldwide (that’s more than any other language). This means that by learning Chinese, one can unlock the potential to speak to over 13% of the world’s total population.

2. Not as difficult as you thought

While most people think Chinese is a tough language, however, according to MIT, learning a little over 500 characters will allow you to read 75% of written Chinese. The task suddenly seems a lot more manageable. Think about it, a huge population in the world speak Mandarin Chinese; clearly learning it is possible!

3. A trend in future

Not only is Mandarin Chinese the fastest growing language in the world, it’s also the fastest-growing second language in the West. In 2015, Facebook CEO & Founder Mark Zuckerberg gave an entire speech in Chinese at Beijing University. During the 2012-13 school year, a majority of states in the U.S. reported that districts were implementing at least one dual language program, with Spanish and Mandarin Chinese the most commonly reported partner languages.

4. Fun to learn

Chinese characters were originally from the ancient Shang Dynasty, which is more than 3,000 years ago. They looked more like pictures at that age. In modern Chinese, you can still find many Chinese characters to be pictographs, such as the word of 山(shān), which means mountain. Chinese also has lots of loan words taken from English. For example, “巧克力(qiǎo kè lì)” for “chocolate” and “沙发(shā fā)” for “sofa.” Learning Chinese is always fun!

5. Unlock a different part of your brain

Studies suggest that people who speak Mandarin Chinese learn how to use both temporal lobes of their brain, whereas English speakers only uses the left side. Both temporal lobes are required to distinguish between words that have different intonations in Chinese. Therefore, Chinese speakers experience more activity in the spatial and visual brain centers. Isn’t that cool?

At Preplingo, we connect our full-time certified Chinese teachers with your students to learn Chinese in an academic rigorous, fun and affordable way. Classes are conducted online. We run after-school program, summer camp and academic program for schools. Join us and start a Chinese program for your students!

Resources used in this article are from The Chairman’s Bao and U.S. Department of Education.

Preplingo showcased at EdHubSTL

August 22nd, Preplingo (formerly NiHao Chinese) was invited to present at the NXT@STL event sponsored by EdHubSTL at the Cortex Innovation Community. The evening’s theme was “The Urgency of Equitable Education: A Call to Action.”

The event was well-attended by education leaders, entrepreneurs, school administrators, and many other professionals interested in innovation in education.

Preplingo shared their message that Chinese is for everyone and that through using our tech-based program, any school—no matter the location or resources—can access quality Mandarin Chinese learning through our online classroom.

Our team was able to meet many interesting attendees and even practice their Chinese conversation skills with attendees from China and other countries. A business leader commented, “the Preplingo program can offer so many doors for students. The earlier they can learn Mandarin, the better.”

This marks Preplingo’s second collaboration with EdHubSTL. Preplingo provided programming for some of their summer programs, connecting St. Louis Public School students with a teacher in China and a fun and engaging Chinese language program. Preplingo looks forward to future collaboration and left even more excited to share their programs to help students access the world through the Chinese language in an accessible and equitable way.

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