Ying Zhou, Assistant Professor of Chinese/Asian Studies, approached the ACE office late last fall to start a conversation about using ACE in Chinese language courses. While lots of brainstorming revolved around that topic, Alyssa Melby, Assistant Director for ACE, noted that Ying was teaching Asian Calligraphy during Interim. She asked, “Want to try an ACE component with that class? I’ve got an idea…”
Thinking through the logistics of the course–these were students just learning the basics of Asian Calligraphy themselves!– as well as the academic goals of the course, Ying worked with the GVPCS coordinators, Savannah Stuckmayer and Laura Berdahl, on creating a three-session club on Asian Calligraphy during January for grades 4-5 in the PLUS program. The first two sessions focused on learning basic brush strokes, and the final session looked at paper cutting traditions associated with the Lunar New Year. Supplies were ordered and paid for through a course implementation grant from the ACE office, too.
preparation
Each group was required to do a simulated ACE teaching demonstration for their peers before they entered the elementary classroom. Ying shared, “The students had a chance to be more aware of creating an inclusive learning environment for the St. Olaf students in this course and for the afterschool PLUS program students. After the simulated teaching session, the students discussed in groups and provided their observations of positive aspects and offered their constructive suggestions to make improvements. For example, in our first group’s demonstration, the class offered a suggestion that we should always respect personal space if we need to stay close to a student and demonstrate brush holding or calligraphy writing.”
outcome
The teaching demonstration not only helped them prepare to work with 4th and 5th graders, it built other skills, as well. Ying said, “The ACE experience helped the students understand in-depth and develop their own perspectives on the course contents. One key technique in writing Asian calligraphy is to write each character in correct stroke orders. There are rules of stroke orders which might be difficult to remember. One group came up with their own acronyms of the rules in their ACE teaching experience. They named it ‘Three Bs,’ which nicely summarized the rules and made it very easy to understand and remember.” Nisha Albert, a student in the course shared that “having to simplify it for elementary versus college kids brings a different level of understanding” to content, too” and builds communication skills.
reflections
Despite challenges that inevitably arose at each session, Nisha felt that there was definitely some positive impact with the students and was impressed by how much the youth learned in just one class. Anna Lahr, another student, shared that “putting an aspect of calligraphy to work was great! The ACE component of the hands-on experience was awesome. Maybe they’ve never had learned it, but it’s new and exciting, a whole new culture, something different in their life.” Nisha further reflected that “Northfield is not a hub of Asian Culture, so it was nice to be able to share a piece it.” Ying, who lives in Northfield, too, relished the opportunity to share and help the local youth grow. She said, “It could be one of the many moments that prepare them for this globalized community. Hopefully, this experience would inspire them to further explore diverse cultures and develop interests in various disciplines.”
Greenvale Park Community School encompasses free, out-of-school time programs at the local neighborhood elementary right in St. Olaf’s backyard. Breakfast Buddies eat breakfast with Greenvale Park students once a week, talking with them about their upcoming day, playing games or helping with homework. The Greenvale Park PLUS program and other clubs are hosted after school for students, and on Tuesday and Thursday nights they host activities for the whole family. For both their afterschool PLUS program and their evening Community School, clubs are formed around certain topics, such as Art Club or STEM club. Recently, a Korean club had been formed, and in general, GVPCS coordinators shared that there was an interest in and enthusiasm for learning about other cultures.
*This story was written about Asian Calligraphy taught by Ying Zhou in Interim 2019.
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