Costa Mesa High students ready to test their Mandarin skills in China

After learning hundreds of characters and countless phrases, students in Costa Mesa High School’s Mandarin 3 class will put their knowledge to use during a spring-break trip to China.

On Saturday, eight students and instructor Lu Wang will leave for Beijing and Xi’an, a large city in central China.

Mandarin 3 is the highest-level class in that language that students can take at Costa Mesa High. By this point, they are learning to write and speak like a native, Wang said.

“Once we get to LAX, I want them to communicate with each other in Mandarin,” she said. “Whether they’re going to go sightseeing, to a restaurant or when they need to talk to someone at the front desk of the hotel, they will be using the language.”

Wang and her students started planning the trip 18 months ago and held fundraising efforts to cover some of the expenses.

Wang had help arranging the trip from Education First, a company that plans international tours for students.

During the journey, the class will stop at locations such as the Terracotta Army sculptures in Xi’an, the Great Wall of China and Beijing’s Forbidden City, an imperial palace that dates back almost 600 years.

“I’m really looking forward to actually seeing the historical sites instead of what I’ve only been able to see on the computer,” said Kris Araracap, a Costa Mesa High senior who is going on the trip. “I’ve always found the Chinese culture interesting because it’s not just one country, one culture. Each province and city has their own thing.”

Araracap and her classmates in Mandarin 3 built their vocabulary, grammatical and comprehension skills in the first two levels of the course. In level 3, they use the language in real-life conversation and writing.

In 2013, Costa Mesa High had two Mandarin 1 classes with about 70 students total, according to Wang.

Now the school has six classes in different levels with about 170 students enrolled, and there are plans to offer a Mandarin 4 class next school year.

“I think the classes have attracted a lot of students who are willing to take some challenge,” Wang said. “Knowing the language could help students with job hunting, or they could include that they are bilingual on their college applications.”

Many of Wang’s students are learning Mandarin as their third language. Some of them are already fluent in Spanish, Vietnamese or Tagalog.

“Before taking [Mandarin], I already spoke English and Spanish,” said Brian Guadarrama, another senior going on the trip. “I grew up with Spanish because my family speaks it, and that made it easy to learn.”

Wang hopes the week in China will help the students ease into Mandarin.

“The best way to learning anything is to have the real-life experience,” she said. “They’ve learned a lot of vocabulary and structure from listening, speaking, reading and writing in class. But once they apply it outside, then that means they have mastered the skills.”