Two new Mandarin Chinese resources have been added to Free Language:

Download Free FSI Mandarin Chinese Language Courses
Rosetta Stone Learn Mandarin Chinese Language Software Level 1 (Commercial)

An incredible website and software tool for learning the Mandarin Chinese language was just added to Free Language:

Adsotrans Dynamic Chinese Annotation Software and Website Project

A great cell phone tool for learning Mandarin Chinese was just added to Free Language:

Mobile Chinese Flash Card Cell Phone Software

From site:

"The school superintendent is recommending that Mandarin be added to the district's language classes.

If approved, the district would offer an introductory class at the middle and high schools.

The decision to add the Chinese dialect will ultimately rest with the Board of Education, which may vote on the proposal on March 8.

As a course, Mandarin is growing in popularity. School officials say the reason is that students want to be competitive in a global market that includes China among the economic superpowers. The language's popularity is fueled by the Chinese government, which has made support for offering and continuing such programs available to the U.S. and other countries."

Read more...

From site:

"Plans announced by the government this week to change the language requirements on the curriculum, enabling schools to switch from European languages like French and German to tongues like Mandarin Chinese and Urdu, have come in for extensive criticism on the grounds of practicality.

The government announced the idea on the basis that there were 'economically useful' non-European languages that pupils could benefit from learning."

Read more...

From site:

" A Mexican financial newspaper has launched a Mandarin Chinese version of its online edition in a bid to meet demand for local news from a growing Chinese community doing business here.

El Financiero's Mandarin version has been live for two weeks, according to Enrique Quevedo, head of electronic media at the Mexico City-based daily."

Read more...

From site:

"Minnesota's education chief backed a push for grants to pay for Mandarin Chinese programs in public schools.

Minnesota education officials said Monday that they will seek money to help public schools start or expand Mandarin Chinese instruction."

Read more...

I wanted to inform everyone about two updates at Free Language that relate to Mandarin Chinese:

MandarinTools.com Online Chinese Learning Tools
Zhongwen.com Chinese Characters and Culture

Here is a list of the podcasts on Free Language. I have bolded the ones for Mandarin Chinese.

Learn Arabic Podcasts
Learn Cantonese Podcasts
Learn English Podcasts
Learn French Podcasts
Learn German Podcasts
Learn Hindi Podcasts
Learn Italian Podcasts
Learn Japanese Podcasts
Learn Mandarin Chinese Podcasts
Learn Portuguese Podcasts
Learn Russian Podcasts
Learn Spanish Podcasts

Here is a list of the video podcasts, though not all languages have them yet:

Learn Arabic Video Podcasts
Learn Cantonese Video Podcasts
Learn English Video Podcasts
Learn French Video Podcasts
Learn German Video Podcasts
Learn Hindi Video Podcasts
Learn Italian Video Podcasts
Learn Japanese Video Podcasts
Learn Mandarin Chinese Video Podcasts
Learn Portuguese Video Podcasts
Learn Russian Video Podcasts
Learn Spanish Videos Podcasts

Free Language Version 2 was just released last night. It is built using Drupal 4.7.

I have bolded the Mandarin Chinese resources below.

There are 12 languages thus far at Free Language

• Learn Arabic
• Learn Cantonese
• Learn English
• Learn French
• Learn German
• Learn Hindi
• Learn Italian
• Learn Japanese
• Learn Mandarin Chinese
• Learn Portuguese
• Learn Russian
• Learn Spanish

For all the Drupalers out there, Free Language v2 is running Drupal 4.7 and following contributed modules were used to beef it out:

• aggregator2
• captcha
• emailpage
• google analytics
• insert_block
• pathauto (to the max)
• poormanscron
• simplenews
• sitemenu
• tagadelic

I tried to keep contrib mods to a minimum while still maximizing the site's functionality.

I am going to upgrade to Drupal 5 as soon as I can get some funds together to commission the upgrade of aggregator2 to Drupal 5. Or perhaps someone will decide to just do it!

Here is a link to the Mandarin Chinese Tags Page:

I have been steadily adding news feeds to Free Language today. A total of 10 feeds have already been added:

Radio Free Asia News in Cantonese
BBC World News in English
BBC Afrique News in French
Deutsche Welle News in German
Corriere della Sera Italy News in Italian
Deutsche Welle News in Chinese
Xinhuanet News in Chinese
BBC Brasil News in Portuguese
BBC News in Russian
BBC Mundo News in Spanish

The idea is that people will be exposed to the idea that they can read news to help learn a language once at a given level of comprehension.