Hero photograph
Group photo speech and paint panda winners
 
Photo by Ms I Ding

Otago Chinese Speech Competition

Ms I Ding —

On Thursday, 27th May, Columba College hosted the 2021 Lower South Island “Chinese Bridge” Chinese Proficiency Competition (汉语桥) for Foreign Secondary School Students.

The "Chinese Bridge" Chinese Proficiency Competition aims to create enthusiasm in students for learning Chinese and strengthen their understanding of Chinese language and culture.

We had a very successful evening with great teamwork. There were eight Columba students participating in the Chinese Speech Competition - Charli Sinclair and Darcy Baldwin (Year 9), Leila Bevin, Emily Sharpe, Rebekah Sime and Kayla Smith (Year 10), Anise Maclean (Year 11) and Maya Bromby (Year 12).

At the Chinese Proficiency Competition, our students presented a 1-2 minute Chinese speech and a cultural performance. Anise and Maya, as senior category students, had been challenged to answer a Chinese question from the judge. They both answered their questions well in Chinese. For cultural performances, Rebekah performed “Taichi Fan” and won the junior Best Talent Performance award. Kayla sang “Dream it Possible”, a Chinese song, Emily recited a popular Chinese poem, Charli, Darcy, Anise and Maya did calligraphy writing. Maya won the senior Best Talent Performance award.

In the junior category speech, Rebekah won 1st place, Kayla and Emily won 2nd place, Darcy won 3rd place. Charli and Leila won the “Distinguished award” in the Junior category. In the senior category speech, Maya won 1st place and Anise won 2nd place. Ms Ding was awarded “The Best Coach”.

Maya, Anise, Rebekah, Kayla, Emily and Darcy will represent the Lower South Island (Otago region) to compete in the South Island final in Christchurch on Sunday, 13th June.

At the prize giving, Year 6 student Peter Choi, Year 9 student Nanni Ge and Year 11 student Anise Maclean received their Paint-a-Panda prizes and certificates from the Deputy Director of Confucius Institute, Associate Professor QianhuaYU.

Congratulations to everyone!

We would like to thank our three student volunteers: Rin Ueda, Koh Miyamichi and Amber Zhang for helping and supporting the event. A big thank you also goes out to teachers and staff for organising and supporting the “Chinese Bridge” Chinese Proficiency Competition.