Many Chinese students studying abroad like to stay with host families to learn their language and culture. Nowadays, many Shanghai white-collar workers have received native English speaking international students as their host families, too, in order to learn English from them.

 

It is usually free for foreign students to stay in a host family in Shanghai, but he/she must take up the responsibility of teaching English to at least one certain members of the family.

 

Miss Li has always worried about her limited English. "I never knew what to say to an English-speaking person," said she. She has taken a number of English courses, but none has proved to be useful. Last year, she saw an ad recruiting host families for foreign students, and that was how Carey (from Chicago, US) came to her home.

 

Carey is actually not a student, but a HR manager. She stays in Li's apartment for free, but has to teach Li oral English for 1 hour every day. "She could hardly speak Chinese at the beginning, and we had to guess what each other meant through gestures," said Li.

 

Two months later, they could talk to each other without gesticulating. Now, Li can communicate with any English-speaking person freely.

 

About one hundred Shanghai families have received foreign boarding students, and the figure is rising.

 

However, foreign boarding students can only help improve oral English, but not examination skills.

 

(Chinanews.cn March 7, 2007)