The advanced Chinese class of the Confucius Institute at the University of Latvia launched as scheduled

At 18:00 local time on September 15, 2020, the Advanced Class of the Confucius Institute at the University of Latvia launched an online Chinese course. Affected by the epidemic, volunteer Chinese teachers could not arrive in Latvia as scheduled, but the epidemic did not break the students’ enthusiasm for learning Chinese, so as not to affect the progress of students’ Chinese learning and examination. Under the guidance of Professor Shang Quanyu, the Chinese director of the Confucius Institute at the University of Latvia, Secretary Maria and volunteer teachers actively discussed course arrangements and student registration to ensure that the Chinese language class is carried out as scheduled.

Through many tests and comparisons between teachers, Webex was finally selected as a platform to carry out online Chinese teaching. The teacher informed the students to prepare for the class by email, considering that the students did not have textbooks, and also sent the students an electronic version of the textbook in the form of an email in order to carry out the teaching smoothly. In the first class, the volunteer teachers and the students met each other through self-introduction. From the self-introduction, learned that three of the students had gone to South China Normal University for short-term exchange and study. At the same time, they were also students majoring in sinology at the University of Latvia, which had developed a strong intrests on Chinese culture at the beginning of learning Chinese. Some students also put forward their goals to achieve this semester in their self-introduction. After the first class, the students sent a positive evaluation of the first class. After receiving the evaluation, the volunteer teacher added a lot of confidence to the future teaching.

We went through a very special period in 2020, but through the efforts of all parties, the Chinese language course was finally carried out smoothly. This online teaching is not only a new exploration in teaching, but also closes the friendship between China and Latvia. Through this course, teachers and students are eager to meet in Latvia.

当地时间2020年9月15日18时，拉脱维亚大学孔子学院本部高高级班开展了线上汉语课程。受疫情影响，汉语教师志愿者不能如期抵达拉脱维亚，但疫情并没有打破学生学习汉语的热情，为了不影响学生的汉语学习以及考级的进度，拉脱维亚大学开学之际，在拉脱维亚大学孔子学院中方院长尚劝余的指导下，秘书玛丽亚与志愿者教师积极商讨课程安排和学生报名工作，以确保汉语课如期开展。

通过志愿者教师的多次测试和比对，最终选定Webex这个平台来开展网上汉语教学。志愿者教师通过邮件的形式提前告知学生做好课前的准备工作，考虑到学生们没有教材，还通过邮件的形式给学生发送了电子版的教材，以便顺利开展教学。在第一堂课上，志愿者教师与同学们通过自我介绍认识了彼此，从自我介绍中得知其中三位同学曾到华南师范大学进行过短期的交流学习，同时他们还是拉脱维亚大学汉学专业的学生，在学习汉语之初已经对中华文化产生了浓厚的兴趣，有的同学还在自我介绍中提出了自己本学期要达到的目标。第一堂课后，学生发来信息对第一堂课做出了肯定的评价，志愿者教师收到了评价后又给今后的教学增添了很多信心。

2020年我们经历了一段非常特殊的时期，但通过各方的努力最终使得汉语课程得以顺利开展。此次网络教学这不仅是教学上的新探索，同时拉近了中拉之间的友谊。通过这次课程，师生们都迫切地希望能在拉脱维亚相见。