info@eastpointsc.org (803) 926-5180
At East Point Academy, native Mandarin speakers teach our students in 50% of their curriculum areas.
Language immersion is teaching method for learning a second language. Unlike more traditional language education, where the language is taught as a subject, language immersion teaches the language as a subject, but also teaches core content in the target language, in our case Mandarin Chinese.
Elementary students at East Point learn via the 50/50 immersion model, meaning students spend half the day in English, learning ELA, Social Studies and various electives and half the day in the target language, learning Mandarin, math, science and arts.
Once students reach the middle campus, they have built a strong base of Mandarin and are able to switch to a language rich model with up to 25% of the day in the target language. The middle campus also offers novice level Mandarin courses for students new to the language.
One of the most common questions we get is, why Chinese? There are lots of great reasons for Chinese immersion. Mandarin Chinese is the most spoken language in the world, with over a billion native speakers. South Carolina is commonly referred to as the gateway to the east due to the vast amount of both imports and exports that are traded through the state every year.
A growing number of Chinese companies are building factories and home offices in South Carolina. Next to the United States, China is the second-largest economy in the world. Additionally, students who learn Mandarin through immersion reap the host of lifelong benefits.
A bilingual brain is more alert, quicker and better able to deal with complex issues and conflict resolution. This is especially true for pictographic languages such as Mandarin Chinese. Through Mandarin immersion cognitive skills related to language and other subjects are strongly improved. Studies also show that students who became bilingual at an early age have less of a chance of getting dementia and other degenerative diseases.
These are just a few of the many benefits. We would love to share more and show you around our campus. For more information or to schedule a tour, email enrollment@eastpointsc.org.
