HFM PTECH Mandarin teacher Ping Huang recently presented at the National Consortium for Teaching about Asia seminar series at Siena University. The seminar is part of a six part series focused on providing K-12 teachers with the content and resources needed to teach about East Asia as identified in the New York state curriculum. In partnership with her colleague, Mr. David Besozzi, Huang presented on her teachings of the Qingming Scroll, a handscroll painting by Song dynasty painter Zhang Zeduan, and how she has integrated it into her classroom.
David Besozzi and Ping Huang hold a reproduction of the Qingming Scroll.
Huang has been a teacher at PTECH for the last eight years. After teaching in China for four years, she immigrated to the United States with her family and took time off to raise her children. She never lost her love of teaching and knew it would be a path she would return to. In 2017 she went back to school to earn her second masters degree in teaching from Clarkson University and it was during this time that she first learned of PTECH and its innovative programming.
“I came to PTECH as an intern from Clarkson and I really enjoyed the atmosphere,” said Huang. “At PTECH you’re not just a teacher, you’re a mentor who offers guidance and support. I love the relationships I build with the students.”
One of the biggest challenges Huang faced was how to utilize class time with students and teach all she could in a short amount of time. PTECH’s Mandarin class is a one-year program taught in ninth grade. During that time, Huang wanted students to gain an understanding of not only the Chinese language, but the intricacies of Chinese culture.
After attending a National Consortium for Teaching about Asia seminar in 2019, Huang partnered with her colleague, friend and fellow East Asia teaching enthusiast, Mr. David Besozzi. Together they worked on incorporating the Qingming Scroll into her classwork and developed the Mandarin children’s book project.
Like the scroll, the Mandarin children’s book project asks students to consider all aspects of Chinese culture – its economy, arts and literature, social structure, and customs and traditions. Students are required to choose a specific character depicted in the scroll, which offers a wide range of people in everyday scenes, and develop their own unique story of that character’s life using what they know of Chinese culture. Working in groups, the students then write and illustrate a children’s book that they read to local elementary school students.
PTECH student Johany Justo Jimene reads her Mandarin children’s book to Johnstown middle school student.
Huang feels this project not only gives her students an authentic look at the Chinese language and culture, but encourages a sense of curiosity about life and customs outside of their own community.
“It’s important to me to open students’ eyes to the fact that there are people in another part of the world living differently than they are,” said Huang. “By learning about others, they can better appreciate those differences. How they choose to move forward with that, is up to them”
The National Consortium for Teaching about Asia seminar is sponsored by the Five College Center for Asian Studies at Smith College and funded by the Freeman Foundation. Huang has been active with the consortium for the last six years and regularly takes advantage of their professional development opportunities. In addition to her masters of teaching, Huang holds a masters degree in contemporary Chinese literature from the Capital Normal University in Beijing, China.
PTECH, or Pathways in Technology Early College High School, is a 6-year program that functions like a hybrid between high school and college. It incorporates project based learning and professional skills training as students work toward their 2-year degree from SUNY Fulton-Montgomery or SUNY Cobleskill at no cost to their families. For more information visit https://www.hfmboces.org/programs-services/ptech/.
