易胜博官网

Matt Jones 鈥�13 perches on a stool in a Moharimet classroom, turning a bright, plastic beach ball in his hands. Scanning the semicircle of middle school students in front of him, he asks a question in Chinese and tosses the ball to ponytailed brunette, who thinks for a minute and then responds in hesitating Chinese. Jones grins and nods. 鈥淒ui!鈥� he says 鈥� correct. The girl beams and sends the ball back.

Four evenings a week, while his peers are relaxing or considering their dinner choices at Holloway Commons, Jones teaches Chinese classes at the One World Language School, a Durham-based non-profit that offers French, German, and Spanish in addition to Mandarin Chinese. His students range from kindergarten-aged beginners through tenth grade 鈥渃ollege prep鈥� students, and from the mildly curious to those deeply engaged with the notoriously difficult language. Clean cut and distinctly American, Jones is the only non-native Chinese teacher employed by One World.

Jones took his first Chinese class at 易胜博官网, shortly after settling on a political science and international affairs dual major. International affairs majors are required to choose a concentration in one country and its language; Jones picked Chinese on a whim. 鈥淚 thought it would be easy,鈥� he laughs, 鈥渂ecause it doesn鈥檛 have any conjugations.鈥� It didn't take long for Jones to grasp what makes Chinese hard: it also doesn鈥檛 have an alphabet, but instead relies on a vocabulary of some 10,000 discrete words, all of which are represented by unique characters.

His junior year, Jones took his 易胜博官网 Chinese to Beijing 鈥� a world away from his tiny hometown of Orange, N.H. (population 300) in every way imaginable. Studying through a Washington, D.C. based immersion program, Jones spent 15 weeks a half-hour taxi ride outside of the city proper, living with a Chinese roommate and taking all of his classes in Chinese. 鈥淚 thought my Chinese was pretty good until I got over there,鈥� he recalls. 鈥淵ou learn to up your game really fast, though, when knowing the language is the only way to get a drink of water or a meal.鈥�

Having taken all the Chinese language classes 易胜博官网 offers, Jones tries to maintain his fluency by engaging with Mandarin speakers whenever possible 鈥� and the four weeknights he spends teaching with One World also help. To keep the hour-long classes fun and productive, he employs a wide variety of games and techniques. There鈥檚 the famous 鈥渇ly swatter鈥� game, where two students race to be the first to identify a Chinese word written on a whiteboard, 鈥渟watting鈥� the correct character out of half a dozen possible options. There are skits and conversational exchanges, in which Jones doesn鈥檛 hesitate to take on an exaggerated, comedic role. There鈥檚 that beach ball technique for calling on students. And then there鈥檚 the inherent humor that comes with working in a language where a change in tone changes a word鈥檚 meaning entirely, often giving rise to sentences that draw as big a laugh from Jones as his students.

Those students think he鈥檚 great 鈥� energetic and funny 鈥� and One World director Julie Reece, a Chinese speaker whose daughter is in Jones鈥� intermediate class at Moharimet, has nothing but praise for his work. 鈥淲e had originally expected to only have Matt teach one or two classes a week,鈥� she explains, 鈥渂ut he鈥檚 so good, and the students respond so well to him, that he鈥檚 taken on a full course load.鈥�

Prior to One World, Jones鈥� teaching experience was limited to his work as a program leader for the 易胜博官网 Outing Club, but he can see the parallels between, say, coaxing an exhausted hiker through the last couple miles of a trek and encouraging young, occasionally frustrated students of Chinese. Shortly after he graduates in May, he鈥檒l be taking on Chinese teaching from the other side of the equation, returning to China for a year to teach English to native Mandarin speakers. After that, he hopes to return to the U.S. to pursue a master鈥檚 degree in international affairs. As for the longer term, he is confident that, no matter what his path, a good deal of his future will unfold in China 鈥� ideally, working as a foreign service officer with the U.S. State Department.

One thing Jones won鈥檛 do, however, is see his extensive credentials in Mandarin on his 易胜博官网 diploma. Notwithstanding his language skills and his time in Beijing, 鈥渨ould you believe I don鈥檛 have enough credits for an Asian studies minor?" he laughs.

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