For three years now, sophomore Kent Bates has been learning Chinese language. It started with just an interest in the language, but he said his mom really pushed him into taking the class at UALR. The class takes place every Saturday from two to three o’clock and has about eleven students along with Bates.

“Everyone wants to learn Spanish or French. I just wanted to learn something different from everyone else,” Bates said.

He said he is not completely fluent, but he plans to take the class until he is. Bates said that although Chinese was a bit difficult, it came easier to him than it did for the other students because he was so young. He said he started out easy and had a great teacher.

“There are two different things you have to learn with Chinese,” Bates said. “There’s the characters and then there is things like Chinese alphabet letters with lots of different tone marks that you have to memorize.”

After every class, Bates is given homework to keep him from forgetting whet he learned during the week. It consists of a few sheets on whatever they practiced that day. He would like to find a way to use this skill later in life and find a job that requires Chinese language. If he finds the time, he would also love to visit China, but he has no immediate plans.

“It feels really good to start learning another language,” Bates said. “Chinese is so much different from English with the way it’s worded and the grammar.”

Bates said he can both read and write in Chinese. It is a skill that most people don’t have, which is exactly why he wanted to learn and recommends it to others. Bates said he feels accomplished after three years of Chinese, but he believes there is always more to learn.