中文课程在美国受欢迎

According to a U.S. survey, three percent of American elementary schools teach Chinese language. Many of them, using materials created and sold by a Korean-American woman who realized nearly 20 years ago, that Chinese would be one of the global languages of the future.
根据美国的一项调查，美国3%的小学有教中文。它们中的大多数使用的是一位韩裔美国女人创作和出售的教材，20年前，这位韩裔美国人意识到中文将会是未来的全球通用语之一。

For Selina Yoon, story-time at this private school in New York City is market research.
对Selina Yoon而言，在纽约市这所私立学校的讲故事时间是在做市场调查。

Selina Yoon, CEO of Master Communications, said, " I love watching their smiling face and how engaged they are and how that’s helping them learn."
Master Communications 的首席执行官Selina Yoon表示：“我喜欢看到他们的笑脸，看到他们有多专注以及这对他们有多大的帮助。”

But 17 years ago, when her own children were this age, there were no schools like this. Selina still wanted them to learn Chinese.
但是17年前，当她自己的孩子在这个年龄的时候，没有这样的学校。Selina仍然想让他们学中文。

Selina Yoon said, "When you look at the population growth and potential, I was convinced that that was the language of the future. I really felt that for their future that it was important for them to be bilingual and know Chinese."
Selina Yoon称：“当你看到人口增加和潜力时，我确信那是未来的语言。我真的觉得，他们以后能说两种语言，懂中文是很重要的。”

Selina left her job as a marketing executive for Procter and Gamble, and used 100, 000 dollars she had saved to develop “Asia for Kids”. She assembled a catalogue of educational toys, books, and created her own distribution system and then took a big risk in this ad.
Selina辞了她在宝洁营销主管的工作，用她存的10万美金发展Asia for Kids。她组装了一系列教学玩具、书籍，创立了自己的经销体系，然后在这个广告上冒了一次很大的险。

Correspondent: “So you spent almost 10 thousand dollars on an ad in a national parenting magazine. Was it worth it?”
记者：“你花了近1万美元在一本全国性的亲自杂志登了一个广告。值得吗？”

Selina: “Absolutely. It was the best learning I got. And I was getting instead of 100’s of phone calls, thousands of phone calls.”
Selina：“当然值得。这是我最大的收获。我得到的不是100个电话，而是几千个电话。”

Half of the calls, Selina says, came from educators. People like Sharon Huang, she started Bilingual Buds eight years ago to teach Chinese to toddlers.
Selina表示，一半的电话来自教育工作者。人们喜欢Sharon Huang，她八年前开办Bilingual Buds，教小孩子中文。

Sharon Huang said, “Hardly anything was available, so what we would have to do is buy story books in English and I would pay teachers to translate. Learning language, you really need to hear stories because that’s where grammar and vocabulary are in context."
Sharon Huang表示：“几乎没有什么东西可以利用，所以我们必须做的是买英文书，我付钱请老师翻译。学习语言，你必须听故事，因为故事的内容里有语法和词汇。”

Now, Sharon Huang buys books, blocks and many of these songs from Selina’s company, Mater Communications.
现在，Sharon Huang的书本、插图和许多这些歌都是从Selina的公司Mater Communications那里购买的。

Demand for Chinese education materials in the United States is only growing. According to a national survey by the center for applied linguistics, between 1997 and 2008, the percentage of elementary schools offering Chinese increased tenfold.
美国对中文教育资料的需求只在增加。根据应用语言学中心的一项全国调查，1997年至2008年期间，小学提供中文课的比例增加了十倍。

3% of American elementary schools now offer Mandarin, and Selina has capitalized on American interest in China.
现在，美国有3%的小学提供普通话课程，Selina从美国人对中国的兴趣中获利。

Selina: “We hit our first million dollars probably within the first two or three years.”
Selina：“开始的两三年内，我们赚到第一个100万美元。”

Correspondent: “Pretty fast.”
记者：“非常快。”

Selina: “Pretty fast.”
Selina：“非常快。”

Her company now works with more than 100, 000 schools around the world and she now creates nearly half the products she sells, designing animation, music and videos to teach Chinese and more than 100 other languages.
她的公司现在和全球的10多万个学校合作，她现在卖的东西近一半是自己创作的，她设计教中文和100多种其它语言的动画片、音乐和视频。

Sharon Huang said, “There are a couple of companies that do what she does, but she’s been doing it for so long that I can say that she’s in a category of 2 or 3.”
Sharon Huang表示：“有几间公司也是做她这个的，但是她做的时间如此长，我可以说她是前两三位的。”

So what’s next a global business series – teaching business culture and language to adults? So when these children grow up, they can learn the skills they need to work in China. Selina said, “We’re kind of growing up with our own customers.”
那么，全球业务系列的下一个是什么——教成年人商业文化和语言？因此，当这些孩子长大时，他们可以学习在中国工作需要的技能。Selina表示：“我们和我们的客户一起成长。”