My eldest daughter is in mandarin school and I honestly am amazed at how much the teacher expects her to learn each week. I'm just teaching my youngest the mandarin alphabet and she's doing well. But teaching and maintaining a second language with kids is difficult. And there are days where I'd rather just speak to them in English.
Though, I must admit, I have a good laugh when kids mix English and Mandarin rules together. For example, I had the following conversation with my kid one day:
"Look mama! Fai ji!!! (It's supposed to mean airplane in mandarin)
"Oh yes! It is! Nice job and good for using mandarin!
"Mama! It's two fai jis!!"
"Pardon me?"
"It's two fai jis!"
This is where I'm trying to contain myself. You see, she has said the word for airplane correctly in mandarin. However, because there are two airplanes...in mandarin, you literally say, two air plane without an s. There are no Ss in mandarin. Yet she took the English rule and added it on there.
For a chinese person, this is pretty darn funny.
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