Reading a Notice About a Community Festival
A Beginners reading task gives students this notice, said to be posted at a Chinese community centre in Sydney:
本星期六上午十点，我们在活动中心开春节联欢会。欢迎大家参加。会上有中国舞蹈、唱歌，还有饺子。请想表演节目的同学星期五以前告诉王老师。参加的人请带一个小菜，大家一起吃。
Students answer three questions. Lin writes: (1) The event is on Saturday at 10 am. (2) You should tell Wang laoshi if you want to bring a dish. (3) There will be dancing, singing and dumplings.
Her teacher says only one answer is fully correct. Lin protests that she understood "most of the words" and that the notice "basically says all of that".
1. Judge each of Lin's three answers against the notice, and explain what reading skill each question is really testing.
Read the worked answer
Answer 1 - correct. 本星期六上午十点 is stated directly. This is literal detail location.
Answer 2 - incorrect. The notice contains two separate instructions and Lin has fused them:
- 请想表演节目的同学星期五以前告诉王老师 - students who want to perform must tell Wang laoshi by Friday.
- 参加的人请带一个小菜 - attendees should bring a small dish.
Bringing a dish needs no notification at all. Lin has matched the word 告诉 with the nearby 带 and produced a rule that does not exist. The skill being tested is tracking which instruction attaches to which group, not vocabulary.
Answer 3 - correct in substance. 中国舞蹈、唱歌 and 饺子 are all listed. A stronger answer would note the dumplings are food, not a performance, but the content is right.
What Lin should learn: in a notice, each sentence usually carries one instruction with its own condition (who, by when). Reading "most of the words" is not enough - she must check who each sentence is about. Her 告诉/带 confusion is a classic trap in Beginners reading.
2. The final line is 参加的人请带一个小菜，大家一起吃. A student translates this as "Participants please bring a small vegetable; everyone will eat together." Explain why 小菜 is better understood here as "a small dish" and how the rest of the notice supports that reading.
Read the worked answer
Why "a small dish" fits better than "a small vegetable"
菜 has a wide range: it can mean vegetables, a dish of food, or cuisine (中国菜). The compound 小菜 points to a modest side dish or a small plate of food brought to share - the potluck sense.
Context clues that settle it
- 大家一起吃 - "everyone eats together" signals shared food, not raw vegetables. A potluck contribution is being requested.
- The event is a 联欢会 with 饺子 - dumplings are already on the menu, so the notice is clearly about food for a gathering. Guests topping up the table with a dish is natural; guests each bringing a vegetable is not.
- 参加的人 - the instruction targets all attendees, so it must be something easy and normal to bring. "A small dish" is; a specified vegetable would normally be named (e.g. 带一点儿青菜).
Translation to aim for: "Those attending, please bring a small dish to share; we'll all eat together."
Exam point: Beginners translation is marked on choosing the sense that fits the surrounding text, not the first dictionary gloss. 菜 = "vegetable" is a common first-listed meaning, and the following clause is the evidence that rules it out.