CAL – 5 INITIATIVE: THE WARMTH FROM A BOOK

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“一切艺术鉴赏根本就是移情作用。(The essence of virtuosity is empathy)” was once stated by Qian Zhongshu, a famous Chinese writer. No matter what language we are using, what culture background reared us, there is always something can inspire us, such as an eloquent painting, and evocative piece of music, or an insightful book.

During the Chinese New Year Festival, CAL – 5 students were recommended a book called “Tuan Yuan”, which literally means “Reunion.” Many students expressed how they were deeply touched by the story and have a strong willingness to bring warmth to those left-behind children which are described in book’s plot.

After the Chinese New Year holidays, students started on a Service Learning project during Chinese lessons on how to share their reading experiences in Chinese. Their writings have been sorted letter by letter through a shared writing platform. They took the initiatives to make a mini-bilingual thesaurus. All the books have been sent to these unfortunate children by using a certain Chinese public welfare App. The students are tracking the deliveries, at the same time, they are hoping those children can feel the warmth from a far-away city.

 

Year 9 Chinese Studies Gets Animated

Year 9 students are learning all about “Chinese Animation Movies” and their history in our Chinese Studies classes, including traditional Chinese art skills which are applied in modern animated films. Today, they went to Shanghai Movie Museum to explore this in greater depth.

During this trip, the students watched a movie talking about the history of Chinese animation, played with the interactive installations, and attended a workshop led by Chinese famous artist, Ms. Xia Jing. After listening to Ms. Xia’s introduction of Chinese ink painting techniques, the students created their own art work with brush and ink. The quality, skill and sensitivity of their works were commended by the artist.

With newly found enthusiasm for this medium after today’s visit to the museum, we are excited about next week’s Chinese Studies classes and anticipate some ‘animated’ discussions about the future of animation in China from our brilliant Year 9 students.