Carden Department of Primary Section of Beijing Haidian Foreign Language Experiment School was founded on May 1, 2001. It has become a teaching organization with nearly three-hundred pupils from grades 1-6 and over twenty teachers at home and abroad. The learning and teaching methods it introduces are sourced from Ms. Mae Carden, one of the most outstanding educators in the United States in the 20th century. The Carden system has its own unique pronouncing and spelling rules, focusing on reading and grammar in the learning process. It goes through a process of from easy to difficult in the proper order and repetition with high quality textbooks and teaching plans. With this, pupils may get a high standard and quality English teaching from grade 1 to grade 6.
Striking and Efficient Teaching Features
With special Carden pronouncing and spelling system, pupils has the ability of pronouncing a word when coming across it and spelling a word when hearing it.
Example 1 of learning pronunciation
Contents: face
The foreign teacher first reads the word clearly.
Then the teacher divides the word, and asks the pupils to say the letters when hearing the sounds.
Teacher: fuh—— Pupils: f. (the correspondent letter)
Teacher: a——– Pupils: a with another vowel says a(letter a and its pronouncing rule)
Teacher: sss—(a hissing sound)—– Pupils: c
Teacher: How do you keep the sound?—- Pupils: Add an e.
The teacher confirms the pronouncing process, asks: The word is…?
Pupils: The word is face. Carden control is a with another vowel says a hyphen c plus e.
Carden control: face (a+–c+e)
Example 2 of learning pronunciation
Contents: faces
The foreign teacher first reads the word clearly.
Then the teacher divides the word, and asks the pupils to say the letters when hearing the sounds.
Teacher: ful—— Pupils: f. (the correspondent letter)
Teacher: a——– Pupils: a with another vowel says a(letter a and its pronouncing rule)
Teacher: s—(a hissing sound)—– Pupils: c
Teacher: How do you keep the sound?—- Pupils: Add an e.
Teacher: More than one face.—– Pupils: Add an s.
The teacher confirms the pronouncing process, asks: The word is…?
Pupils: The word is faces. Carden control is a with another vowel says a hyphen c plus e in parenthesis; s says ez.
Carden control: faces (a+–c+e)
From the first grade on, the pupils gradually master the Carden controls. At first some simple letters then to complex letter clusters, such a process is also a process of the expansion of their vocabulary.
From the first grade on, the second part of spelling class is sentence dictation. The pupils complete the sentences word by word after they hear the teacher’s reading. From grade 2 on, the second part of spelling class is spelling story. Guided by the foreign teacher, the pupils practise listening, speaking and writing at the same time, and enhance their understanding of the new words by the spelling story.
In the third part, there is a part of sentence analysis. The subject, predicate and object are analyzed. Key words and the title are introduced.
Example:
Sentences analysis(from spelling book of grade two):It eats lots of seeds and beetles that hurt plants.
Teacher ：Who or who not alive?(subject) Pupils: it（subject is it）
Teacher：Doing?(predicate verb) Pupils: eats
Teacher：Whom or what?(object) Pupils: lots of seeds
Teacher：Is there a joining word？(if there is a connective) Pupils: Yes， it is and.
Teacher：What？(second object) Pupils: beetles that hurts plants
Teacher：What is the keyword？ Pupils: that hurt plants
(keyword)
Teacher：What is the title for the keyword? title Pupils give their own answers
The teacher give the title:The amount of Seeds and the Harmful Beetles That It Has Pupils write down the title.
When pupils enter grade 4, they can give the title themselves.
The contents of spelling books from grade 4 to grade 6 are about geography, history and humane knowledge of North America. The sentences are complicated. With the help of the teacher, the pupils analyze theses sentences, find the key words and the titles and finally, they can give the themes of sentences.
Characteristics of Carden Department
American English
1.) Teaching syllabus, plans and materials keep in synchronization with those of Carden,
2.) Monthly tests for all grades keep in synchronization with those of Carden schools in the United States.
3.) Carden English for primary pupils is graded in 6 levels, one for each grade. Grades 1-3 focus on the Carden pronunciation control and dictation. The whole system progress from easy to difficult with emphasis on the step-by-step development of the children, which is in accord with the children linguistic and cognitive development. Pupils can develop evenly in listening, speaking, reading, writing and thinking abilities.
4.) 2-3 class periods a day, including:
A. daily conversation with foreign instructors and Carden English knowledge review
B. the Carden pronunciation and spelling control and dictation (the first class period everyday is the practice of pronunciation and spelling);
C. foreign instructors teach reading comprehension and rhythmic reading in groups of 5, other children doing the exercise-book independently—Carden training of the pupils’ emotional and stamina quotients
5.) More than 600 class periods an academic year including special assistance and daily study sessions.
6.) Each English class has about 15 pupils. The lectures are given by American instructors with the help of Chinese assistants to ensure the learning quality. This ensures the promised learning quality and helps the students develop a comfortable relationship with the instructors and spelling test.
7.) Every week there is a quiz and spelling test to check the pupils’ achievements during the week. Every month there is a test to check the spelling, listening and reading comprehension skills: Gradually sentence-analysis and grammar will be included in the monthly tests. If parents require, Carden Department can provide individual and class analyses of each monthly test
8.) Vocabulary development each year is between 500 and 1000 words.
9.) Every month, the American Carden Educational Foundation and instructors will arrange various activities according to the festivals and holidays in English countries every month. Carden Educational Foundation also distribute some fine printed materials about world people, geography, history, and other topics with pronunciation classes in order to enrich the out-of-classroom activities and broaden their knowledge, cultivating their interests in learning English.
After 6 years’ of study, the children can acquire a level of English listening and speaking approximately the same as that of grade 5 pupils in the U.S., and a level of English reading and writing approximately the same as that of grade 6 pupils in the U.S. Pupils take yearly examinations every academic year. Core items of the examination will be the same as that of the same grades in American Carden schools.
Carden China 
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