What's Good for the Goose is Good for the Gander. or: If Two Children Have to Learn English, We Should Have to Learn Some Mandarin

This year, I have 2 students who immigrated from China over the summer. I can't imagine the stress they must be under. To leave a place where you know people, speak the language, understand the culture, and to up and move somewhere totally different. I am not sure if they came from a city or a small community, but if they came from a city... well add that culture shock to it! Because the province I live in has under 200,000 people province wide!
Today I decided if they have to learn English, well we can learn some Mandarin. Please don't ask me why it's taken this long for that epiphany to hit me, but at least it came! Our Kindergarten math outcomes go up to the number 10, so I thought we could at least learn to count to 10. Well, let me tell you! The boy just stared at the video- stared like, "they are speaking my language for once!" and my little girl giggled and giggled at my pronunciation.  She would just say, "No Mrs. Marshall! No!" which reminds me of my daughter when I try to speak French (No, mom, just don't even try...). All in all, I thought the video worked well. The English speaking students enjoyed trying a new language, and the Mandarin speaking students had something they could (finally!) identify with.
Well, riding high off the success of this, I decided I needed to learn how to say "hurry up!" in Mandarin as my boy likes to take his own sweet time getting undressed from recess. So, I Googled it, practiced it, and waited for my moment... It finally came... He was dancing around just enjoying life and I said, in Mandarin, hurry up! Well! I have never seen him react with such speed. He stopped, looked at me, and went right to work!
Little did I realize that this would open the door to a whole new relationship. It is customary for our Chinese immigrants to take an English name (I don't know why), so my friend tried to teach me to pronounce his Chinese name (I got a lot of No Mrs. Marshall, NO!). But the best part was the end of the day as we were lined up to go out to the busses. He stopped me and explained, very carefully, how to say, "See you tomorrow!" in Mandarin. And then he tried to teach me "car" -he loves cars. Loves them!
What did all of this teach me? All it took was a 2 minute video of counting to 10 to open up a whole new relationship with 2 of my students. Two students I have been trying to connect with since September. I've been planning to speak with the parents of these two, hoping to set up a time where they can come and speak to the Kindergarten classes about China, moving to Canada, and just some really cool Chinese things. This has just spurred this idea on. I'm looking forward to parent teacher interviews next week.
And tomorrow? I have a feeling that tomorrow, I will learn many new words.