Mandarin Excellence Programme

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DS has the opportunity to take part in this programme at his new secondary school in September (well, apply - I think it will be quite competitive to get in) - it involves a total of 8 hours of mandarin study a week (some in class, some after school club, some at home). Some immersion trips along the way. They claim near fluency by GCSE. School gets quite a lot of funding to run it. Does anyone have experience of this? How intensive is it really, and do they progress as fast as is suggested? Have DC enjoyed or regretted doing it?

www.gov.uk/guidance/join-the-mandarin-excellence-programme

My friend's daughter (now in Y8 I think) does this. She says it's amazing but quite intensive, so your child has to be prepared to put the work in and make it a real priority in his life.

(I am jealous, wish this has been around when I was at school!)

Mandarin is a lot of hard work DD did it for 9 years and requires attention to detail to ensure the characters were correct. DD dropped it for GCSE as she has a visual processing disorder so her oral, aural and comprehension scores were excellent she could not write the characters fast enough to get a reasonable grade.

It's fantastic and a great opportunity for anyone to gain a valuable skill relevant to the future world.
My son is nearing the end of year 1 of the programme. There are extra lessons, spread out before/after school on 2 days and also approx 1 or 2 saturday morning sessions per month. This is where living close to the school is advantageous.
Progression is quick. As with all languages, basics are learnt first, but conversations are soon occurring on specific topics. I love listening to him speak it!
Many people will probably show interest at the beginning, and a selection of candidates will occur during the first year, to determine competence and also commitment.
My son has really enjoyed it so far. I can't really help him with it, so he is on his own to some extent, and I do wonder if this is what motivates him to succeed.
Pupils will probably be exposed to Mandarin in Year 7 (if not already at primary school), which will either inspire them to do MEP or make them think it's not for them.

DD dropped it for GCSE as she has a visual processing disorder so her oral, aural and comprehension scores were excellent she could not write the characters fast enough to get a reasonable grade

Wasn't it possible to apply for extra time?

@havingtochangeusernameagain she has 25% extra time and use of a laptop for her exams, but even with extra time it was not enough for her in year 9 exams she got 96% in oral, 95% in listening comprehension and 93% in reading comprehension. Then 45% in written exam, the vast majority of what she got down was correct, but she completed less than 50% of what she needed to.

Thanks all, it’s really useful to hear your experiences. Really not sure!

My DS does this at his school and is in year 9, had a fantastic trip to China as part of his studies and loves it, would recommend it if they have the opportunity.

My DD did this. We’re a trilingual family and she finds new languages easy. She took it at GCSE and got an A* and is now at Uni studying languages.

My DS is in Y8 and doing this.

A lot of the kids have found it quite challenging, perhaps due to the very different strict teaching style of their Chinese teacher. Quite a few have dropped out.

DS is persevering and taking GCSE and off to China for two weeks in the summer. We are using it as an excuse to order lots of takeaway to acclimatise him to the food.

On a shopping trip on a sunny day recently, he was amusing us by stealthily attempting to translate people’s dodgy tattooed as well as general Chinese signage.

My son is also Year 8 and part of the MEP Programme at his Grammer school. When he gained his place at the school we were emailed to ask if we wished to apply for him to take part in the programme - I have no idea how students were selected or how many applications there were for the 30 places available.
DS is also travelling to China in July - the prospect of the trip was one of the things that excited him the most about learning Mandarin though now it's around the corner he's very apprehensive.
He has 4 hours of timetabled lessons per week and from the regular updates from school the class seems to be doing very well so far and are achieving good test scores.
There does seem to be a lot of testing in this subject - listening, speaking and writing tests as each topic is learnt.
We don't know any Mandarin speakers so we can't offer any help - I know several people who are fluent in French, Spanish etc but for this subject he is on his own!

@TinklyLittleLaugh hiya - can. I ask you if your child is having any vaccinations for their China trip. My son is going in July and we've just had an email from his school today regarding deciding whether to have them or not - the email just directed up to the department of health website 😁

My daughter's school does this although she's not actually doing it herself.

I would go for it. Not only is it a useful skill but I would imagine the brain stretching involved would be excellent for his learning all round. Presumably he could drop out if he really hated it?