KEY POINTS:
Confucius say getting Kiwis to learn Chinese is like banging head against brick wall.
That is probably what the great Chinese philosopher would say if he were alive today - going by the experience of staffers at an Auckland Chinese institution named after him.
The Confucius Institute, which is celebrating its first anniversary today, has found the going tough in its effort to get New Zealanders to become "China literate".
"Sometimes it seems like it's almost impossible," said institute director Nora Yao.
The Confucius Institute's mission was to make Mandarin the second language of choice in New Zealand schools, but it is finding it to be a mission impossible.
It tried marketing the language to principals in Auckland, Christchurch and Wellington - but none has bought the idea.
The institute offered free Mandarin taster programmes to Auckland schools, but only 13 schools accepted the offer - and less than half of those said they would consider offering lessons in the language after the free trial period ended.
Ms Yao said: "I guess New Zealanders have lived in a society that is monolingual for so long that it is hard for them to see the importance of learning a language other than English."
But Belmont Primary School principal Bruce Cunningham, who had signed up for the free taster programme but stopped offering the language after it ended, said the real reason was the lack of time and resources.
"We can't find the time to fit it into our busy curriculum, and also it's not easy finding a teacher who is proficient in teaching Mandarin," he said.
Ministry of Education statistics show Chinese remains the least popular of foreign languages taught in New Zealand schools.
Only 0.6 per cent, or 7000 students, learn Mandarin, compared with 7.7 per cent doing French and 5.4 per cent learning Japanese. And 80.1 per cent of New Zealanders do not learn any language other than English.
But Ms Yao said the institute had plans to increase the 7000 figure to 50,000 by 2011, and said the new requirement for all intermediate schools to offer a second language would make that possible.
To mark the institute's first anniversary, Professor Zhang Jun, a scholar and commentator on China's economic reform, will speak this afternoon at the institute.
