While most of the students were unfamiliar with the “Chinese lady” coming to speak to them, by the time she left, they had already spoken a few words in Chinese.

Linda Yu, television co-anchor of ABC 7’s 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. newscasts, spoke to about 600 students from Heineman and Marlowe middle schools in Huntley last week to impress upon them the importance of communication. And she gave the students their first lesson in Chinese, prompting them to say “ni hao,” or hello.

District 158 School Board members approved a plan to offer Chinese as part of the foreign language curriculum in both the middle and high schools in Huntley beginning next year.

“We’re in the process of looking for a teacher,” Superintendent John Burkey said. “That’s part of why Linda was invited (to speak).”

Yu first was asked to visit last fall by former Education Foundation President Bob Hurrie, who said he was delighted she finally accepted his invitation.

Yu presented a special news report she had done on China, emphasizing the growing economic importance of the country in the world market. She also described her first day of kindergarten, which was her second day in the United States.

“I was not quite 5 years old when I came to the United States from Xian,” she said. “My parents had both learned English in school in China. So on the way to the United States, my mother thought she should teach me some English.”

Her mother brought her to school, where she said she was surrounded by her classmates, who, with their light hair and fair features, looked strange to her. She whispered, “Hello.”

“There was a bully in the class, and he walked up very, very close to me and poked me in my eye,” she said, prompting her to whisper the only other words she knew in English: “Thank you.”

“I didn’t know it that day, but I think that day something happened inside of me that said, ‘You know, it’s really important to learn to communicate in this new country you’ve come to,’” she said.

She told the group how Chicago schools continue to expand classes in Chinese in an effort to better prepare students, adding, “You are a part of this movement (to learn Chinese).”

Yu went on to earn a degree in journalism from the University of Southern California, and has won four local Emmy awards for her reporting. She serves on the board of the Juvenile Protective Association and is an advisory board chairperson for the Chinese American Service League.

Burkey said the Chinese teacher to be hired will rotate between the high school and the two middle schools. He has said that economists predict China will be the largest economy in the world in the near future, so the decision to offer the language “was an obvious one.”

Before she left, Yu had the students practice saying “wo ai ni.” She said they all had made her feel very happy.

“You just said you loved me.”