Donglin Chai received her MA (2012) and PhD (2017) in East Asian Languages and Literatures at The Ohio State University with a concentration in Chinese Language Pedagogy. A pedagogue by training, Chai is a leading scholar and practitioner of the Performed Culture Approach, a paradigm-shifting pedagogical framework in the field of East Asian language pedagogy to help learners effectively communicate with native speakers of the target culture.

During the past nine years, Chai has published eight peer-reviewed articles in international academic journals, three textbook series, and one edited book chapter, all relating to pedagogy. Since 2017 she has served as a manuscript reviewer for Routledge, The University of California Press, Chinese as a Second Language: The Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association, USA, Journal of Chinese Language Teaching Methodology and Technology (USA), and Palgrave Handbook of Chinese language Studies. She is currently completing a book manuscript about the history of Chinese language education in the US through the generous research support from the University of Iowa. 

Over the past decade, Chai has taught as visiting or adjunct faculty at The Ohio State University, Loyola University Maryland, University of Maryland Baltimore County, and Grinnell College. Before the pandemic, she also directed the US Department of State Critical Language Scholarship Chinese Language Study Abroad Program (Xiamen, China) and co-directed The Ohio State University–Soochow University Summer Chinese Language Study Abroad Program (Suzhou, China). She also worked as a teacher trainer and mentor for novice teachers at the Chinese and Japanese Intensive Summer Program by ALLEX at Washington University in St. Louis. Since Fall 2024, Chai has been developing and teaching a dual-campus Chinese Culture Club after-school program in the Iowa City School District and building three local public libraries’ Chinese language collection.

Since 2019, Chai has been co-editing an online weekly magazine on Chinese language pedagogy through the popular social media platform WeChat. This online magazine adopts a multimedia format (audio, video, image) and its vivid presentation and diverse contents have attracted over 7,000 subscribers worldwide. 

As a member of The Chinese Language Teachers Association (USA), Chai has actively participated and won Cheng & Tsui Professional Development Award (2018) and First Prize of Cengage Learning Award for Innovative Excellence in the Teaching of Chinese as a Foreign Language (2014), both awarded by the association. 

Besides she also squeezed time to serve her city's Parks & Recreation Commission (Member) and an Iowan chapter of the Asian and Pacific Islander American Public Affairs Association (Secretary). When she is not working, you can likely find her spending time with her husband, preschooler, and her mom workout group.

Helen H. Shen, Professor, Department of Asian and Slavic Languages and Literatures, The University of Iowa, USA. She served as Academic Coordinator of the Chinese Program, Director of Graduate Studies for the Department; college board SAT Subjest Tests Committee in the U.S.; Roundtable Grant Committee of the National Federation of Modern Language Teachers Associations in the U.S., grant Evaluator for the International and Foreign Language Education grants of the US Department of Education, Research Grants Council of Hong Kong, and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. From 2012-18, she served on the Board of Directors for the Chinese Language Teachers Association, USA. And served as President for the association in 2016. 

Professor Shen‘s major research areas are Chinese L2 literacy development and reading education. She has published dozens of journal articles and is the author of Teaching Chinese as a Second Language: Vocabulary Acquisition and Instruction (Second Edition), and lead author for the books of Introduction to Standard Chinese Pinyin System, Learning 100 Chinese Radicals, and Routledge Intermediate Chinese Reader. She is editor for the book, Teaching Chinese as a Second Language: Character and Word Teaching Methods and co-editor of the book, Research Among Learners of Chinese as a Foreign Language. 

She is the recipient of an International Research grant from the US Department of Education (2005-08) to develop the comprehensive web-based project--The Chinese Reading World. She is the recipient of three summer STARTALK grants (2010, 2016, 2017) and one year-round STARTALK grants (2022) from the US Government. In 2015 she was invited by the Mandarin Institute--Loyola Marymount University STARTALK Infrastructure Program to direct the construction of the first online K–5 word frequency database for Chinese L2 learners. 

Professor Shen retired from the University of Iowa in 2023 and remains as Professor Emeritus. Currently she serves on the editorial board for the four academic journals and US government's Critical Language Grant evaluator, and Vice President for Asian Pacific Islander American Public Affairs Association-Eastern Iowa Chapter.

Na Li, President of the Eastern Iowa Chapter–Asian and Pacific Islander American Public Affairs Association (APAPA).

Hello, I am Jacky Xiao. I was one of Chai Laoshi's students for five years and have learned much from her courses. In high school I was a part of a robotics team where I specialized in programming and now I am a student at the University of Maryland, pursuing a degree in computer engineering. I enjoy writing software to solve problems within my daily life and learning more about low level computing. Currently I work within the university's College of Education, where I write software to help streamline various processes within the workflow of the college. In my free time I enjoy video games, cooking, and drawing. I have been doing digital art for about six years now and am glad to have the opportunity to help Chai Laoshi.