Writing about the joy of learning Chinese, Spence’s Ashley Y. ’19 recently won the Golden Apple award for the Chinese Language Association of Secondary-Elementary Schools (CLASS) National Essay Contest and the Outstanding Performance Prize in the Sixth Huayu U.S. Chinese Essay Contest for Youth by China Press.

In these essays, Ashley wrote about her mother’s efforts to help her learn Chinese and her creative ways of teaching that made the process “meaningful and joyful.”

 

“Her continuous support and guidance eventually led to my own genuine interest in learning Chinese,” Ashley said. “I also wrote about how I, in my high school years, really started to take learning into my own hands and to seize every opportunity to improve my Chinese, whether it was reading, writing, speaking or listening. I gathered more knowledge, not only by reading and learning from textbooks, but also from Chinese pop music, Chinese movies and TV shows, and trying my best to communicate in Chinese with my friends from China and Taiwan.”

In addition to the online essay submissions, Ashley had to undergo a timed, onsite writing competition after winning the first round for the China Press contest—an experience she described as intense and stressful.

The essays were evaluated on components such as comprehensibility, ideas, word choice, syntax and presentation and characters. Ashley believed her penmanship, vocabulary and good evidence helped her win top marks in the contests.

Ashley gave credit to Chinese teacher Cynthia Ho-Donaldson, whom she described as a key mentor, for encouraging her to enter the contests.

“Seeing my potential and passion in learning Chinese, she suggested that I enter these competitions,” she said. “Although at first I hesitated, I am very thankful that Ms. Ho-Donaldson encouraged and nudged me out of my comfort zone. Now I have come to realize that not only am I proud of what I had accomplished, but also I will be able to inspire others with my journey of language learning. I grew up in the United States and had never thought that I could be good at Chinese. I feel that my story can encourage people to learn Chinese and can assure them that it is possible to excel in Chinese, as long as one has a genuine passion to do so.”

Ashley has big plans for her future: She would like to continue studying Chinese and Asian studies and learn more about Asian cultures and languages. She is also planning to write a book in Chinese about her learning process and her insights into cross-cultural differences. In addition, she will be participating in community outreach here and abroad, and she will soon start her training as a junior Chinese reporter, which is an opportunity awarded to her by China Press. In this position, Ashley will learn more about journalism, photography and media in Chinese, and her work will be published in the China Press. She will also travel to China to work with the local media.

Already, Ashley has been published in World Journal, which is the biggest Chinese newspaper in North America. She has also visited Taiwanese schools and delivered a speech at one school last year on educational differences between Asia and the United States.

“I am invited to talk to more students in China and will do a short exchange program this spring break,” she said. “I am very excited about this as I am very interested in cross-cultural comparison.”

In addition, Ashley was invited to the Chinese Culture Program for Children at Columbia University to talk about learning Chinese and to participate in community outreach. Because she won the CLASS contest, Ashley has also been invited to the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages in November for an awards ceremony.