By Ms Tingting Zhang, Chinese language teacher

16 students, accompanied by myself and Ms Kath Notley, travelled to China during the April holidays as part of the China Language Tour.

Students commenced the tour in Shanghai before heading to Xian to immerse themselves in history and visit the Terracotta Warriors. The final leg of the tour was to Beijing where students were hosted by the Beijing Concord College of Sino-Canada and were able to participate in home stays with local families. The students also visited another Round Square School, Keystone Academy, as well as the Australian Embassy in Beijing where they met with Australian staff.

Students were able to immerse themselves in a wide range of activities and experiences whilst on this tour and the homestay opportunity was a highlight for many of them as seen in this homestay reflection below.

The homestay with Anna was probably the best experience I have ever had. I was able to ‘live like the locals’ for 2 days and experience the Beijing lifestyle. Anna and I tapped into our creative sides in these two days and made some handmade traditional Chinese dresses called Hanfu for her dolls. We went to a DIY workshop and made some items of our choice with lots of charms. We also made matching resin paws to remember each other in the future. I also learnt a lot of new words from strolling in the night stalls, going to the supermarket, and driving around Beijing such as 户籍 (public census), 茼蒿（crown-daisy leaves) and 簪子（hair clasp). I would 100% recommend experiencing a homestay as it allows you to truly understand what the life, language and culture is like.

In short, the China Language Tour was a fantastic chance for our students to learn and apply the language skills they've learned. The homestays were especially valuable, allowing students to use their language skills in real-life situations. Overall, this tour was an invaluable experience for language learning and cultural immersion. We hope to continue organising such study tours for our Chinese class in the future, providing more students with the opportunity to experience language learning in real-world settings.