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Students in Julie Wang’s Chinese classes recently visited the Winter Lantern Festival in Tysons Corner ahead of the Chinese New Year in February. The class walked through hundreds of handcrafted lanterns illuminated by LED lights and viewed the larger-than-life lanterns featuring Chinese cultural symbols that the students had been learning about. While at the festival, students listened to Ms. Wang explain the significance of Chinese iconography, including lotus flowers and bamboo. The festival also featured arrays of running horses that symbolized a prosperous year for 2026, the year of the horse. “This flex block contributed greatly to our understanding of Chinese culture and helped us apply our Chinese to real-life situations,” Minh Duc N. ’28 said. “The Chinese locals running the event were considerate enough to help us learn by engaging with us in Chinese conversations.”