April 20th this year marks the 14th United Nations Chinese Language Day, and 
also the 4th International Chinese Language Day jointly initiated by the Center 
for Language Education and Cooperation and Chinese Plus. To celebrate this 
festival for Chinese language enthusiasts across the globe, the School of 
Foreign Languages of Southwest Jiaotong University teamed up with Pandaful to 
launch the "An Adventure with Pandas" series of five livestreams targeting 
Chinese language enthusiasts in the U.K. and the U.S., with support provided by 
the China Conservation and Research Center for Giant Panda and the Chengdu 
Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding.

More than 9,500 students from some 430 primary and secondary schools in the 
U.K. and the U.S. and eight American universities signed up for the event, and 
the audiences put forth more than 60 questions related to the giant panda. 
During the livestream session for American university students, pupils from 
Washington University in St. Louis, Duke University, Howard University, Boston 
University, University of North Carolina and Miami Dade College, among other 
institutions, discussed with giant panda experts the functions of giant pandas 
in ecological protection and their roles as umbrella species, and quite a 
number of American collegiate students used fluent Chinese to pose questions to 
the panda experts.

During the livestream session for American youngsters, the audiences watched 
the story about giant panda Tao Tao's survival in wilderness, and they left 
comments such as "I love Tao Tao!" and "protecting the giant panda is very 
important".

The livestreams for British youngsters were respectively held in Oxford and 
Scotland. During the Oxford session, students eagerly participated in a 
knowledge competition about the giant panda, and they created their own stories 
about the animal using giant panda handicrafts they made themselves. During the 
event, the sponsor also provided to children in Scotland imagery of the giant 
pandas Yang Guang and Tian Tian prior to their arrival in Scotland in 2011, and 
a primary school student watching the livestream said: "I wasn't born when Yang 
Guang and Tian Tian arrived in Scotland, I ought to call them elder brother and 
elder sister."

This event was also a special event in a project under the Center for Language 
Education and Cooperation and "Youth Link Chinese-Foreign Youngsters 
Conversation on Cloud" program of Southwest Jiaotong University. This activity 
offered both Chinese and foreign youngsters a platform to share and follow 
topics of global conversations, and served to foster cultural exchange and 
interaction. Professor Li Chengjian, Director of the International 
Communication Center of Southwest Jiaotong University, expressed: "I am happy 
that Youth Link can function as such a bridge."

As one of the six official languages of the U.N., the Chinese language has 
played an instrumental role ever since the inception of the United Nations. 
Data indicate that more than 80 countries around the world have included 
Chinese as part of their education system, and there are more than 30 million 
people learning Chinese outside China. At present, the International Chinese 
Language Day has been held for four straight years, having garnered 
participation from some 150 million person/times from more than 150 nations 
across the planet.

Source: Southwest Jiaotong University

Image Attachments Links:

   Link: https://iop.asianetnews.net/view-attachment?attach-id=440274

   Caption: Livestream with American youngsters

   Link: https://iop.asianetnews.net/view-attachment?attach-id=440275

   Caption: Students in Scotland and Oxford watching livestream of giant panda