Language Studies __________________________Pages

Language Studies

Italian Trip – December, 2019

The Italian trip was definitely a once in a lifetime opportunity. Not only did I experience what it was like to live as an Italian student, but I also made some amazing friends. Being the oldest student on the trip I wasn’t too sure how that would be, but learning more about the other students on the trip was something I didn’t expect and everyone was so nice. On top of that, there were so many people in Italy who had such amazing stories to tell. I hope that one day my Australian family and my host family will meet sometime in the future!

Daniella O’Donnell, SHC, Year 12 student

Attending the 2019 Italian trip was the highlight of our lives and luckily, we went before all this COVID-19. We have created lifelong friends with the people on the trip from classmates to teachers to our amazing host families. We spent one week in Milan with our host families and experienced their everyday life. It was surreal putting into practice the countless years of linguistic studies. During this time, we established connections with our Italian host students, which we will all cherish forever. In addition to this, we all spent two weeks travelling to the most iconic landmarks of Italy. There was a wealth of cultural elements we experienced which encompassed the traditional foods, architecture and music. Overall, this was an amazing journey which we will all look back on and for which we will be forever grateful. Special thanks to Brendan Reed, Mark Turner and Antonella Masia for attending this trip with us and lastly to Louisa Biviano for organising this outstanding trip.

Luke Carra, Lachy Demasi, Emma, Erin, Georgia, Steph, James Bove, Annabelle, Josh Belleggia and Matt Tripodi

Remote Learning in Chinese 2020

Despite the overall demotivating year, I found that I have had a great time studying Chinese in Ms Stewart’s class. The content that we have covered this year has been interesting and informative, and was able to enlighten us with knowledge about Chinese culture, geography and etiquette. As well as that, the level of camaraderie in our classroom greatly propelled the overall enjoyment of the class, and made learning easy going. An important aspect of this year would be teachers finding fun ways to engage their students during remote learning. Ms Stewart has done a fantastic job in this, introducing cooking classes that demonstrate Chinese delicacies. Some dishes that our class have cooked include fried rice and wontons, which are not only simple to create, but also give a basic insight into a complex Chinese food culture.

Patrick Pham

Italian Trip

Throughout my time at SJC, Chinese has underpinned the notion of a fulfilling, challenging, and recreational class. In a way, it is the perfect storm for a motivated student who is willing to set themselves up in regard to both in-school achievement and future aspirations. Chinese as a senior student means small classes and specialized teachers, where the textbookcentric learning expands into a high intensity teacher-student interaction and student-student collaboration or activities. At the beginning of this year, when everything was normal, students were able to have this typical communication, alongside an expectation of cultural excursions later in the year. Of course, that would not become a reality. Learning a second language this year was obviously difficult during remote learning. An upset to the conventional medium through which we learnt the subject – oral repetition and teacher-student interaction – effected many students’ motivation. To alleviate this issue, the class decided to have a cooking class. The reprieve from remote learning and bedrooms alike was really refreshing. That, and delicious chaofan (炒饭-fried rice) meant that we were able to really enjoy the Chinese subject with each other and family. So, what’s the harm in doing it twice? In our second stint of remote learning, we were faced with the same dilemma and returned to yet another cooking session with Mrs Stewart. This time it was yuntun (云吞-wonton). Seeing all the other students cooking alongside you was the highlight, apart from eating and sharing fried wontons. All things considered, a return to on Campus learning will probably be met with mixed feelings by many, but being back in class with peers and friends is preferred by all.

Max Anderson

Chinese in 2020

Chinese 2020 – I cannot sum it up in one word but it was a journey. Learning Chinese in Year 12 at times was challenging, but was also an enriching experience. From the start of the year, the six of us have come a long way over the years from a class size of 20 down to six. It has provided us a unique experience. No other subject would possibly have such a small cohort, which allowed us to work closely with our Chinese teacher Mr Branchflower, with Mr Zhang also running extra classes throughout the year. In the lead up to one of our SACs, we watched “The Farewell”, which gives a real-life example about the Chinese cultural phenomena, “Face”. I would say it was difficult learning Chinese via Zoom to say the least as your not there physically in person speaking and learning the language. I live by the motto that was told by our teacher every day, “Study hard day after day.” Most of us in class in the future hope to continue Chinese in our tertiary studies.

Nicholas Naumovski, Year 12

Learning Chinese Remotely included some cooking at home!