Category Archives: Mandarin teacher interview

Featured Mandarin Coach of the Month – Sunny Dang

This month we interview one of our star Mandarin coaches – Sunny Dang. Sunny is a native Mandarin speaker, and a certified TCSL teacher based in Beijing.
She has achieved a Bachelor’s degree from Beijing Language and Cultural University. Read on for some great Mandarin learning tips from Sunny!

CA: Tell us a little about yourselfSunny
Sunny: My name is Sunny Dang and my Chinese name is Dang Yanfen. I’m from China and I’m a Chinese teacher. Chinese is my native language.

CA: Tell us about your teaching experience
Sunny: I am extremely passionate about teaching languages and have taught at all the levels. I have an offline teaching experience of 10 years and have also been teaching online for the last 6 years!

CA: How do you think learning new languages is beneficial?
Sunny: Learning a new language is like an eye opener towards a new culture. Like for a person learning Mandarin, he grows to learn the folklore, history, traditions, cultures and so much more! It is also great to improve communication and business prospects with a new geography. China is a growing economy – people are looking to study in China, do business with China, learn about the culture further – knowing Mandarin goes a long way in making these more fruitful.

CA: Please give our readers some tips on learning Mandarin Chinese
Sunny: If you are learning on your own, it’ll be better to listen to the audio, and practice with native speakers. This will help in improving your pronunciation and you will be confident to speak in public. If possible, take some tutoring lessons to make sure your tones are correct. If you can spend 15-30 everyday on learning Chinese, that would be ideal.

CA: Tell us about your most interesting experience while learning or teaching Mandarin yourself
Sunny: I enjoy teaching children a lot because I can play games with them. They are some of my sharpest learners! :)

CA: How have you worked with CultureAlley to spread the love for language learning
Sunny: I have worked very closely with CultureAlley since their inception to create their Mandarin content. And since then been tutoring with them to help more and more people learn new languages.I enjoy working with them a lot!

CA: How can our learners get in touch with you?
Sunny: They can post their questions on the CultureAlley forum and I can respond to them. They can also take personalized 1on1 Skype sessions with me :)