Putting in a good word for culture

Over 5,000 primary school students from 41 countries participated online in the 2022 contest and 51 candidates made it to the online finals.

When Zoey showed her passion for language at age 5, her parents, who spent their honeymoon in China, chose one of the world's most-spoken languages for her.

"They think it's one of the most useful languages, hoping that I can learn about different cultures and lifestyles and become a citizen of the world," says Zoey, winner of the 2022 Chinese show for foreign primary school students in the program.

At the Chinese immersion school where she studies in the US, Zoey finds it difficult to learn mathematics, because many courses, including mathematics are taught in Chinese, but the math tests are in English. She finds Chinese reading more difficult than listening or speaking, as the vocabulary is so large that she may encounter unknown characters. Once her Chinese teacher asked her class to make a book on their own with drawings and words to practice writing, and Zoey wrote a long story.