Watching my younger brother begin Chinese as a second language.
A student-built learning project
Author &
Project
Nihao World began with a question: could learning Chinese feel more memorable, engaging, and connected to the culture behind the language?
About Nihao World
Why I built it
Nihao World began in 2025, when my younger brother started learning Chinese as a second language at a local Chinese school.
I saw how much time beginners could spend memorizing words without remembering or comfortably using them. Their reading level could also keep them from exploring the stories, history, and everyday life that make a language interesting.
I began building Nihao World as a summer project in 2026. Based on Easy Steps to Chinese for Kids, Books 1A through 4B, it combines interactive practice with cultural content chosen for children’s age and curiosity—not only their reading level.
Chinese culture goes far beyond red envelopes and Chinese New Year. It includes history, art,
inventions, stories, geography, traditions, and everyday life.
Stories and culture were some of my favorite parts of advanced Chinese classes. I wanted beginners like my brother to experience them from the start. Nihao World builds on classwork with engaging practice and cultural discovery.
Turning the idea into a website with language activities and culture stories.
Testing, correcting, and learning from feedback.
Current project snapshot
What the project includes
Counts reflect the current production site and will change as Nihao World grows.
Building Nihao World
Technology as a creative tool
Nihao World is also an experiment in what one student can build with today’s technology. Codex helped me code, revise, test, and coordinate image work. ChatGPT helped develop content, research cultural topics, compare sources, and organize references.
One surprise was that early conversations with DeepSeek helped shape the site’s visual style, even though I used it much less throughout the project.
AI helped with drafting, illustrations, audio, background research, and coding, but the core ideas—child-friendly UI, engaging learning activities that balance fun and challenge, and cultural stories adapted for different reading levels—came from hundreds of hours of human judgment, design, and revision.
Website
HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, bundled with esbuild into a lightweight static learning site.
AI collaboration
ChatGPT supported content and research; Codex supported coding, testing, and image workflows. DeepSeek influenced the early visual direction.
Recorded audio
The site’s Mandarin pronunciation recordings were generated with OpenAI’s gpt-4o-mini-tts model and reviewed for accuracy.
Source & delivery
GitHub stores the project source and history. Cloudflare delivers and protects the public website.
Thanks
Built with ideas, feedback, and support
I am grateful to my parents for their encouragement and support, and for suggesting cultural topics I might not have thought of on my own. Most of all, I want to thank my younger brother, who inspired this project and was one of the first people to try it. His honest reactions helped me see what worked, what was confusing, and what I could make better.
Thank you to everyone who has helped test and improve Nihao World.