Students sit in class, laughing and smiling.

The Middlebury Chinese School enrolls a highly diverse student body, including college undergraduates, graduate students, recent graduates, and professionals. 

The Chinese School offers students an unparalleled opportunity to learn Chinese language and culture. In just eight weeks, with the support of a dedicated faculty and staff, a rigorous, well-implemented curriculum, an immersion environment, and a low student-teacher ratio, our students make unimaginable progress.

The program typically enrolls a highly diverse student body, including undergraduates, graduate students, recent graduates, and professionals. Students immerse themselves in the language and culture through their academic work, commitment to the Language Pledge®, and participation in a variety of cocurricular activities. Activities in and outside of class require the use of spoken and written Chinese.

Curriculum

Students are exposed to texts prepared in both traditional and simplified characters, as well as to a variety of vocabulary and usages current in both mainland China and Taiwan. All instruction and materials will be presented primarily in Simplified Chinese for lecture, drill, weekly homework, grammar and vocab handouts, and tests. Students have the option to use either traditional or simplified for their homework, essays or tests.

Courses in modern Chinese are offered at the beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels. They are designed to help learners of all ages to develop and improve listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills.

See more about courses.

Level

Placement in a specific level is determined by language proficiency. All students take a language assessment prior to the start of the program. The language assessment is not part of the application process. Read more about level placement.

Assessment

Built into our curriculum is an active assessment component that monitors and measures student progress. Low faculty-student ratio ensures each student receives individual attention. Both teachers and students work diligently as coaches and learners, respectively to ensure that each student’s ability to understand, speak, read and write Mandarin Chinese improves dramatically day-by-day throughout the summer.

Daily Schedule

Classes and cocurricular activities are scheduled for Monday-Friday, while films, hikes, performances, and social gatherings are scheduled for the weekends.

Class Lecture 8:00–9:50 a.m.
Group Drill 10:10 a.m.–12:00 noon
Individual Practice 1:30–3:30 p.m.
Cocurricular Activities 4:00–5:30 p.m.
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