Bilingual Chinese Tutor & K-12 Coding Instructor | UC Berkeley CS

Larry Z.

I'm a Computer Science student at UC Berkeley with a strong background in bilingual education and coding instruction, having taught students ranging from elementary schoolers to adults over the past few years. At Leap Dragon, I worked as a Mandarin Chinese tutor, teaching students from kindergarten through high school as well as adult learners preparing for the HSK exam. My teaching approach adapts significantly by age group: with younger children I focus on interactive, game-based learning to build vocabulary and conversational confidence, while with older students and adults I structure lessons around grammar, reading comprehension, and exam strategy tailored to their proficiency level. Alongside Chinese tutoring, I also taught Scratch to young students, introducing them to programming logic through visual, project-based lessons.

Building on this experience, I later taught at Coding Minds in Irvine, where I worked with a broader age range spanning elementary, middle, and high school students across multiple subjects, including Scratch, Python, Java, and video editing. This role required me to constantly adjust my teaching style to match each student's technical level and learning pace, from introducing basic programming concepts to younger students to guiding high schoolers through more advanced coding projects. As a Berkeley CS student, I bring both academic rigor and hands-on teaching experience to my tutoring, and I'm passionate about helping students build confidence in both language and technical skills through patient, individualized instruction.