My daughter is studying at a Chinese school in the western suburbs of Chicago. The school has been open 24 years, and states its goals thus: in their ten years there, pupils should first learn to recognize, pronounce and write 1000 Chinese characters, and then on this foundation further improve their speaking and aural comprehension skills.
小女就讀的芝加哥西郊「合作中文學校」，成立至今已有廿四年歷史，該校的目標是：學生在校十年，能夠認、讀、寫中文字一千，以此基礎，再進一步加強說與聽。