A Country Possessed with Learning Chinese – Singapore

This is how I would describe my country, Singapore. It is a small place, strategically positioned between the East-West shipping route, and has a majority of Chinese immigrants who arrived mostly in the first 50 years of the 20th century.

It is a country outside of the East Asia region that has the highest percentage of Chinese population. Even though the majority population is Chinese, the national and working languages are not Chinese due to practical and survival considerations. English is the lingua franca for most Singaporeans.

Government's efforts to promote use of Chinese

Ironically, this is the country with the longest held campaign to urge Chinese to learn Chinese and speak Mandarin. Held since 1979 for more than 30 years with yearly budget allocated to promote the use of Mandarin among Chinese in Singapore.

Another organisation, Business China, was set up in 2007 to nurture bilingual and bicultural Singaporeans with the aim to strengthen ties with China.

Struggle in a bilingual education system

Chinese is a single subject in schools, where curriculum is taught in English for all the other subjects. Even though most students only study one subject in Chinese, the demand for tuition centres for Chinese language is tremendous. Institutions providing Chinese tuition and enrichment programmes are ubiquitous.

This shows the struggle students face in a bilingual education system. Chinese language is such a different subject that demands a lot of students' memory and time. In order to help students cope with such demands, there were so many tweaks to how Chinese ought to be taught in schools. Interventions include focussing more on Hanyu pinyin and less character writing and complementing teaching with English explanation. Other non-teaching interventions include changing the examinations format, introducing enrichment programmes to stimulate interest and cultural immersion programmes in China. Introducing different syllabus for students with different capabilities – Higher / Advanced Chinese for better students.

You'll not find another country that is more possessed than Singapore in learning Chinese.