Mandarin III is an upper-intermediate course designed to advance students toward a higher proficiency level. Building on Mandarin IA, IB, and II or equivalent experience, students will explore topics such as Chinese given names, the great thinkers Zhuangzi and Confucius, four-character idioms, the Spring Festival, and Beijing opera. By the end of the course, students are expected to have learned approximately 650 characters, enabling them to recognize up to 1800 words. They will engage with selected Chinese texts on cultural topics, and will be able to express themselves, participate in discussions, and communicate in paragraph-length conversations on both familiar and some new social and academic subjects.