As long as I took my education from basic education to secondary education and above, there were always foreign language lessons at my school, English and Mandarin. For my school, Mandarin is the number 2 foreign language that must be mastered, my school also provides facilities for its students to take the HSK test, I have passed two levels of the exam. I am grateful that my school facilitates this, because in my opinion the certificate of exam results given is also an important thing and can become a provision for my future.
Mandarin is one of the subjects hated and has become a problem for almost all of my friends. I personally really like the lesson because I think the lesson is interesting and also more relate to me because I am a Chinese . However, this was different from some of my friends, almost all of them hated Mandarin lessons. This Mandarin lesson was considered their enemy.
Some of the reasons they don't like Mandarin lessons are
"Do not understand Mandarin and very difficult to understand"
"It's very difficult because the writing of each word is so different from Indonesian"
"Mandarin is only useful for people who want to study in China"
"There are so many things to understand such as hanyu pinyin, vocabulary, mandarin letters which tend to complicate things"
"Dizziness read it and also hear it"
"Indeed not interested"
Not a few of the students, including myself and almost all of my friends who understand what is said in Mandarin, but it is difficult if asked to speak in Mandarin, because they are not fluent in pronunciation and vocabulary mastery. Because we tend to only memorize vocabulary and pronunciation for exams or tests and after the test or test is over, 60% of what we have learned is forgotten and not applied in everyday life.
In my opinion, this is wrong, of course. One of the impacts is because of the education system, Mandarin language lessons usually have to start from the basics and gradually so that all students can understand and understand. However, in my school for transferring children from other schools, they had to immediately adapt and follow the lessons even though at the old school Chinese lessons were not taught, this led to incomprehension and of course being left behind. In addition, some students do not understand the lesson well, lessons that use Indonesian have not yet passed, how about mandarin lesson? More bad.
In response to this, the teachers in my school also created an interesting and exciting education system, such as practice and games. Several times we were taught the art of paper folding and cutting. There is also teaching through interesting games such as guessing pictures and guessing styles which will later refer to vocabulary. This is done by the teachers so that students can be interested and like Chinese lessons slowly and it is true that all students in the class are excited and interested in participating in games and the art of paper folding.
In my opinion, Mandarin is a language that must be learned. My suggestion for the Chinese language learning system should be held as creative as possible and as interesting as possible, such as through Mandarin songs that the students like, games referring to vocabulary learning and so on. With this, it can attract students' interest in Mandarin.
Mandarin is widely needed in Indonesia nowadays. It is used in many fields, like in service, tourism, education, marine, and journalism industry. Practical Mandarin is definitely required in the working world. Manpower with additional abilities and skills such as foreign language mastery would improve their competence in the competitive working world.
In my opinion, besides Mandarin, other foreign languages must also be mastered, especially our international language, English. By mastering a foreign language, it will be an added plus score in our self, because every company will choose people who speak foreign languages over people who do not fluent it at all. In addition, we must fluent in English so that we can develop and compete with other countries. Foreign language is also one of the important things in communication, by fluent in foreign language we can communicate well and fluently with people from any country without misunderstanding. With foreign languages, we can cooperate internationally in all aspects such as business, economy, education, social and others.
That's all I can say, sorry if there is a misuse of words, and hopefully this is useful for you, thank you for reading.
Widya Marcelina (200907210) Class B