ROGERS — After months of studying Chinese customs, culture and history, teacher Cheryl Turpin will step on a plane Sunday to see China for herself.
Turpin, an English as a Second Language reading teacher at Greer Lingle Middle School, was selected as one of eight teachers for this year’s Bringing China to Arkansas Program. The monthlong tour will visit Shanghai, Chengdu, Xi’an, Beijing and the Guizhou Province. Other participating Northwest Arkansas teachers are from Siloam Springs, Farmington, Fayetteville and Springdale, Turpin said. She will return July 4.
Little mementos from Rogers will go with her. There are fistfuls of tie-dyed Lingle pens and more than 100 pieces of student work — fiction and creative writing examples, pen pal letters, artwork and pieces contrasting the zodiac as used in the Americas with the Chinese zodiac. Students culled pieces from their portfolios to send along.
“My students have been a part of the whole process,” Turpin said.
When she got word in January she was selected for the trip, she shared her homework with the class. Since many of them are new to the U.S., they can identify differences between cultures, and all of them know the challenges of learning English, she said.
The program is in its 12th year, said Martha Morton, director of the Arkansas Global Program at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. It is paid for by the Freeman Foundation.
“We train all year long. The trip in June is just the icing on the cake,” Morton said.
FAST FACTS
People’s Republic of China
- Han Chinese make up 91.5 percent of the population.
- Mandarin, spoken by the Han ethnic group, is the primary language.
- China has the largest population in the world with an estimated 1.3 billion people.
- An estimated 47 percent of the population lived in urban areas in 2010.
Source: Central Intelligence Agency World Factbook
The group will visit a Heifer International project outside Beijing to see how an Arkansas organization works in China and will visit schools in Chengdu, capital of the Sichuan province.
Turpin plans to focus on minority languages of China as part of her learning experience. There are 56 ethnic and language groups, Morton said. Mandarin Chinese is the primary language. The group will visit southwest China, which has many minority language groups. Official schools teach Mandarin, and for children in the outlying provinces, it is important they learn the official language, Morton said.
Turpin said she hopes to find contacts in Chinese schools where her English learners can exchange information with Chinese students learning the same language a world away.
Bringing back lasting learning about China and a connection to its people is the goal of the program, Morton said.
“Our one-year intro is meant to motivate our participants,” Morton said.