Do you know any short, fun cultural activities?

[philipbeckwith]

Hi Everyone!

 

We are organizing a Spring Festival activity at my school for our Chinese language students. We need activities that are 10 to 20 minutes long that will be Chinese culture oriented. They should be fun and obviously quick to learn. The students are in middle and high school.

 

Any ideas?

 

Thanks

 

Phil

[Shelley]

As soon as I saw this topic I thought I am sure we have had a similar question before and after a quick bit of searching I found the topic. Its a request for similar activities for a school introduction to chinese.

 

It may have some ideas that could be useful to you.

 

The topic is here http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/49088-school-project-indtroduction-to-chinese-advice/

[ChTTay]

Include one or two Chinese New Year crafts. Just googling that brings up a load of different stuff you can do. The easiest looks to be making paper lanterns but there are others. With the right prep most could be done in 20 mins.

Making dumplings could also be a good one. You prepare or buy the dough and whatever filling, students just get to put the filling inside and make the dumpling, then they cook/eat them. Actually, it's better if you prepare good ones for them to eat. Usually the ones they make are most inedible as they fall apart.

These students will already study Chinese or not? If so you could come up with some language games. I wouldn't suggest anything to hard. Perhaps a scavenger hunt where they must find different characters then use those to spell out a Chinsse new year themed sentence.

[JenniferW]

Some simple red paper cuts?

[philipbeckwith]

Thanks everyone! You are a big help! 

 

And of course more ideas are appreciated! We really want to give our students a good time.

[ChTTay]

@ OP

What ideas do you have already? What do you have in mind for this activity?

Have you looked at crafts? If so, what do you think??

[Hofmann]

An organization at my school recently did a crafting event. Among the crafts were knots and making shuttlecocks (毽子). For knots, consider 梅花結 or 吉祥結, and attaching tassels (as knots look weird without tassels).

[Clarice Zhao]

Recently, the 4^th annual Shenzhen international chess tournament was held on Dec 6^th, 2015. This event attracted more than 100 good chess players from different countries get together to compete with each other. In addition to play chess, the players also gain friendship with people from different countries. Hanbridge Mandarin School, the organizer of this event, provided an opportunity to strength the connections between different cultures.

 

You can search the 4th shenzhen international chess tournament on youtube, there are some videos about that activity.

 

I think the international chess tournament was a very great fun culture activity, and this event held every year. If you are interested, you can take part in next year.

[Hofmann]

OP needs 20-minute activities, and he probably prefers Chinese culture-related activities.

 

But that reminds me, go is pretty easy to learn. Beginners should play on a 9 by 9 grid.

[roddy]

Hanbridge Mandarin needs to limit themselves to one account and stop looking for excuses to post about their school. 

 

It's more comic relief than anything else, but a chopstick based competition - how many peanuts can you eat with chopsticks in a minute, something like that - is always good for a giggle. The older and more dignified the participants the better...

[ChTTay]

You can do a "chopstick" relay race too. Essentially put two piles of slips paper (with stuff on that you need to match e.g picture of a cat and the word cat) at one side of the room . Have two teams relay race to collect the paper - one piece at a time using chopstick. Once they've got enough, they need to start matching the paper.

You could do it without matching but it becomes less educational and just a race in that case. You could teach some very basic, easy characters and have them match the character and pinyin.

[Shelley]

how many peanuts can you eat with chopsticks in a minute,

 

Don't wish to be a party pooper but in a lot of schools peanuts are banned because of severe allergy problems - its a good idea just try jelly beans instead.

[philipbeckwith]

Thanks again everyone! I really like the chopsticks competition.

[ChTTay]

Glad you like the ideas...

... Do you have an idea of what'll do now?

Have you looked at crafts? If so, what do you think??

[somethingfunny]

In addition to what Roddy said, let's not forget that Chess isn't a Chinese related cultural activity.  Unless it's Chinese chess, but the competition referred to here is just normal chess.

 

How about writing their name in Chinese?  With a 毛笔 I mean and all the other calligraphy stuff.  We had an activity once where a teacher wrote their names in Chinese beforehand and just handed them out to the students.  They loved them, but I think it would have been nice if they'd had a crack at it themselves before being given the nice one.

[philipbeckwith]

Sorry for the delayed reply ChTTay. Yes, we pretty much have a good handle on what to do. The suggestions here were IMMENSELY helpful.

[ChTTay]

Right, so ... What did you decide to do?