The Fructuoso Rodríguez Basic Secondary School, in Plaza de la Revolución municipality in Havana (Cuba), began offering Chinese courses to seventh-grade students on March 7.
Pursuant to an educational exchange agreement between the ministries of education of the People’s Republic of China and Cuba, the latter has begun to introduce Chinese as an optional second language in secondary education. This will be a slow process in which Chinese will be optional and not part of the school curriculum. Like English, it will remain a subject in the junior high school curriculum. Teacher Jiaqi Hou, who is fluent in Spanish, began teaching the language on an optional basis to 130 seventh-grade students at Fructuoso Rodriguez Basic Secondary School. As part of the framework cooperation agreement, 120 books were received, including exercise books, manuals, dictionaries, and some traditional toys, to support the students’ learning. The agreement also includes the granting of scholarships and the exchange of information on topics related to early childhood education, special education, and technical-vocational education.
Main story:
Granma Cuba (official newspaper of the Cuban Communist Party): Estudiantes cubanos podrán aprender idioma chino en la Secundaria Básica.