2. Analysis of Data Gathered
As part of my research, I made a survey for all the
year 6 students from Glenealy Junior School (an
ESF Primary School). I chose the school as the
majority of students from it will carry on and
study at Island School. I asked them questions
relating to Mandarin. The data gathered will help
me notice what the students are lacking in terms
of awareness, motivation etc and to include it in
the video. Basically, the data will be incorporated
and fully explained in the video (so the content of
the video will be covered based on the
quantitative data).
3. When the Gleanealy Students were asked how many foreign languages they
learn in school, 100% of stated that they all study only one language. This means
that the School has specifically geared students to study one language in
depth, symbolizing importance and value of the language. This will most
probably lead students in choosing that specific language in Island School. This
question is relevant as it shows that the majority of students will pick the
language they are currently learning and it enables us to include in the video the
importance and effect of learning only one foreign language in depth.
4. All the 60 students learn Mandarin in Glenealy, which shows that school
things that it is a great value for students to learn. This question is relevant
as in the video we know that we are able to persuade the students that
since all of them have learnt Mandarin, they should carry on learning it in
Island School which in the long-run would benefit their future.
5. All the 60 students learn Mandarin 5 times a week in Glenealy, which once again highlights
the importance of the language and in the long-run would gear students to take it at Island
School. When I was at Glenealy we only learnt Mandarin twice a week, so this change proves
that the significance of the language is increasing as the years go by. This question is relevant
as in our video we can persuade that students that they will be good at Mandarin (therefore
they will most probably choose it) which is evidenced to the fact that they learn it every
school day and have good experiences with Mandarin.
6. Roughly 38% of students said that their parents can speak Chinese and about 62% said they couldn’t.
However, I find this piece of data to be surprising as we are living in Hong Kong, and the majority of people
living in Hong Kong are Chinese even though Hong Kong is a multi-ethnic society. This could mean that the
parents of the students learnt Cantonese or simply that their parents do not speak Mandarin at all. It is a
known fact that a child will learn the languages their parents speak. This piece of data shows that
awareness needs to be drawn for students to take up Mandarin because of its growing significance in the
future. This question is relevant as we can mention in the video that the students should learn Mandarin
so that their future children will be able to speak Mandarin; and by that time Mandarin will probably be
even more important than it is now.
7. More than half of the students have learnt Mandarin since year one. However 20 students have not. This
indicates that the 20 students must have not been in Glenealy from the beginning or that their previous
schools did not teach Mandarin. Even though the 20 students is less than half of Year 6, it is a third of the
year and shows that attention needs to be brought to other schools around the world that they should
start to offer Mandarin as a foreign language in primary schools as opposed to French, German, Spanish
etc. This question is relevant as the data gathered will once again be incorporated into the video to prove
to the students that they should not fear the challenge of learning Mandarin as most of them have already
have been learning it for a rather long time.
8. 88% of students agree that learning Chinese is important whereas 12% do not think it is
important. Even though the percentage of people who agree of its importance outweighs the
percentage of people who don’t; attention needs to be brought to the minority of students
because it truly is important for their future. This question is relevant as the data incorporate
shows that we do not need to convince a lot of people that Mandarin is important. Since it
shows that most of the year 6 students agree that Mandarin is important to learn; I am
considering to include some year 6 students in the video to persuade fellow pupils that
learning Mandarin is important. The idea of including some year 6 students is only an idea, I
think the idea is effective because often children learn concepts from other children of the
same age.
9. The majority of students said they think they would choose Mandarin when they
join Island School. However, about 43% of students said they would not. The 43%
of students almost make 50, so it proves once again that students should be made
aware of the benefits in the long-run of choosing Mandarin at Island School. This
question is useful as now in the video I know that the importance of learning
Mandarin should be emphasized.
10. The majority of students said that they do not enjoy learning Mandarin at school whereas 5%
said that they sometimes do and the majority of 58% stated that do they do not enjoy
learning Mandarin. The data gathered is useful as now I know to include that the fun stuff in
life do not always fully benefit people, as well as giving examples of other things which are
not fun but beneficial. For teachers (Mandarin teachers) who end up watching my video
when it is ready, they might be able to increase the students interest of Mandarin and to
make classes more enjoyable which will benefit the students and an increased percentage of
students will take Mandarin if it is more enjoyable. The latter is the point of this video).
11. The majority (58%) of the students said that they think that learning Mandarin is difficult whereas around
42% of students said that they do not find that learning Mandarin is difficult. The 41% of students
indicates that the students come from a Mandarin speaking background or that they have had extensive
learning in Mandarin. Difficulty affects whether the student will choose the subject as student obviously
most of the time would want an easier way out. Therefore, this question is useful as we know that in the
video we should include how to overcome the diffulties of Mandarin, and once students realize that
Mandarin is not so hard is it seems, more students in the long-run will take it and notice its importance.
12. More of the students said that they would choose Mandarin in Island School, however this is not
even half of the people out of the 60. 7 less students said that they would choose Spanish, which is
a very close difference. The results as a whole are very close together; the range of Mandarin and
Japanese is only 15, which shows that students are not aware of the importance of Mandarin. This
is a useful question to help us in our video to emphasize once again the importance of learning
Mandarin. The data has given me an idea to include statistics in the video about Mandarin and the
other foreign languages as statistics is persuasive.
