New Opportunities to Study Chinese and Zoology

Nǐ hǎo! A new greeting can be heard in the halls of the Upper School this year—this one in Mandarin Chinese. Upper schoolers are enjoying the new Chinese language course and looking forward to the option of taking a class in Chinese culture in the spring. The Chinese courses are taught by new faculty member Christina Threlkel (C’04), who double majored in world perspectives and religion, and went on to earn a master’s degree in East Asian studies with a focus on modern China at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Threlkel has also studied Chinese language and literature in Beijing, Nanjing, and Taipei, and Korean at Ewha University in Seoul. In just a month, the students have learned some basic vocabulary and grammar, how to recognize more than 20 Chinese characters, and the fundamentals of pronunciation—quite a feat since each word can be pronounced in four different “tones.”

Upper School students may also enroll this year in Introduction to Zoology, a yearlong, college-level life science course taught by Preston Larimer. The same class is offered as a term course at the College taught by well-known marine biologist Dr. Scott Eckert. Upper schoolers receive high school credit and may be eligible for one term of college credit upon successful completion of the course. This is the only dual enrollment class currently offered at the Upper School.

The twelve seniors taking the course are all serious science students. Many of them are considering science as a college major and all are eager for the challenge. The class will study invertebrates for most of the year, beginning with protozoa and moving on to sponges, corals, jellyfish, and continuing up the chain of animal complexity. In the first lab involving the classification of protozoa, students observed, took notes, sketched their observations, and performed simple experiments on living specimens. Initial reactions to the swarm of little gnat-like creatures under the microscope—”Oh, this is so gross”—quickly changed to fascination: “This one looks like Florida!” and “What’s happening? This one’s reaching out its arm!” “It’s not an arm. It’s a lobopodium,” Larimer quickly pointed out. The students were intently engaged for more than an hour with the only complaint being, “I can’t finish my lab sheet. I’ve got amoeba all over my hands.” Well, this is hands-on, experiential education after all.