What common ground does the daughter of the former US President's daughter, Malia Obama, Facebook's CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, and the current President Trump's granddaughter, Arabella Kushner share?
They all learn Chinese. They are just a few examples of celebrities taking Chinese classes. If you search the keyword "Chinese Language" in Google Trends, you will find how popular this topic has been on the internet. The graph below taken from google shows people's interest in the Chinese language during the last 90 days.
Why learning Chinese is getting more and more popular worldwide?
Here are some reasons: From an economic perspective, China is currently the second largest economy in the world with a strong momentum of continued growth. It is estimated that China's GDP will eventually surpass the US in the years to come. Along with its economic development, China has been playing an increasingly important role in international relations, technology, and scientific research. Furthermore, learning a language that is currently spoken by more than 10 billion people will definitely open a new window of opportunity to those who learn it. And this ancient tonal language can also help develop a bilateral relationship between the two hemispheres of the brain.
Language immersion, which can be briefly understood as teaching a language by being surrounded in that language, has been proved as an effective way to learn a second language because it helps learners to use what they have learned in real communication scenarios. Immersive programs can also help students to understand the culture behind the language as learners are "thrown" into the sea of the target language while learning. They must know how to "swim" by themselves.