I'll bet the alledged parents will be surprised to hear this.
It's usefull for slaves to know the language of their masters...
That's right.... what a time-waster, when the Chicago Public School system is having such problems, they're shutting down 18 schools next year.
Well, those children are simply going to learn the most common language in the world.
I think it is great. I also think that they can learn it without skimping on basics like history, math, etc.
I love the Chinese language and just wish I had started it as a kid instead of my 50s. Learning the pinyin (the abc written word) makes sense if you are also learning the characters along with it, as the character itself gives you a picture, if not the idea of the meaning of the word. It also makes the brain work - at any age.
When these kids get to college. they will have a head start if they wish to pursue it further.
Gong Xi Fa Cai!
What a looney article. SOME Chicago kids are learning Chinese just as SOME are learning Spanish and French and German and Italian and Russian.
While the clueless probably are unaware of it the fact is that those kids who are studying Physics, Calculus, Chemistry are EXACTLY the same kids learning Chinese. Many schools require a foreign language.
When I took Spanish decades ago do you think I did not ALSO take Advanced Chemistry, Advanced Math and Physics?
It's not insane to want them to learn another language. Granted, Chinese might be a bit much - but I know if it were me, I would love the opportunity.
And English isn't neccesarily easier - I've known it all my life, but I still have trouble with it.. but what scares me, sometimes, is that I have a better grasp of it than people two times my age. Or that are my own age. (You'd think that since those self-same people my age are normally public-schooled, I, as a homeschooler who rarely actually studies, would actually be worse off. I have friends older than me who spell and punctuate like they are still in grade-school, so..)
Most people who speak English as a native language view any other language as "hard/impossible to learn" or "barbaric" (though you don't see "barbaric" much these days!), and yes, it will be hard - especially for Mid-/Far Eastern languages, because those are written with symbols.. and read from right-to-left (top-to-bottom is traditional for Chinese, and Japanese) as a rule. But if you put your mind to it, it can be done.
And who knows, maybe those children will find that they LIKE learning Chinese! (I, personally, think it's a beautiful language. Of course, I'm a language nut, and have a list a mile long of languages I wish to learn. Japanese (Nihongo) is my focus, though!) And as other people have pointed out, it could help them with their English. Or learning in general.
~Moshi-chan