The Bub in the Belly

We recently received official confirmation that the Julia Gabriel Centre for Learning will be moving out of its premises at Evans Road at the end of this year. All Mandarin classes will be centralised in their new Mandarin setup at Rochester Mall, called Chengzhu Mandarin Centre. Their English classes will be transferred to their branch at Forum.


I think this is a fantastic development because it means that the children will have a wholly Chinese environment, rich with language and culture, which I think is the best way to learn the language. From the programme information of Chengzhu Mandarin Centre, it looks like the Mandarin Edudrama will be revamped and presented as 1.5 hour classes called "Language Learners" and "Language Skills". Other specialised Mandarin classes will also be offered, eg. "Cultural Arts", "Mental Arithmetic", "Han Yu Pin Yin", "Creative Writing" and "Mandarin Expressions".




Another consideration is that we are planning on sending Ryan to Berries next year for Mandarin enrichment. We realised that we would have to rearrange our weekend schedule to accommodate this, maybe even drop a class, but we never got around to deciding anything. It was a bit of a headache so we pushed the decision off. Perhaps this development points the way out - drop both classes at Julia Gabriel, which leaves us with Berries, swimming and Shichida. A good mix of Mandarin enrichment, something sporty/physical, some mind-training, and still lots of time to play and explore. It all falls into place, no worries.


Actually, according to the programme description at Chengzhu Mandarin Centre, the new Mandarin Edudrama class for Ryan's level (Language Skills) will incorporate not only speaking and listening, but also reading and writing, which makes it similar to the classes offered by Berries. Julia Gabriel programmes are known for their speech and drama elements so I suppose the new programme will still retain that strength and Berries will still have an edge on reading and writing (at least for now) - that's my personal "unprofessional" view, as I have not attended any classes with either centre.


So assuming that the two sit on opposite ends of a see-saw, which side do we sit on? Well, we choose Berries, because we want to start focusing on reading and writing Mandarin (and learning these skills in a fun environment, which is what Berries is known for) and secondly, because there is a branch near where we live.


We do feel that the speech and drama instruction in the Julia Gabriel Edudrama classes has been good for Ryan (I will post a review later) so we'll look into similar classes for him when our weekend schedule frees up a bit in the future.


So it looks like the coming term will be Ryan's last term with Julia Gabriel, and certainly his last term at Evans Road. Oh well, as Richard said, "We had a good run and it was fun while it lasted". We will always have fond memories of Ryan's 1.5 years there, all the loving teachers and all the fun times.

[All photos taken at Oversea Restaurant in Beach Road on 19 June 2011.]