When BCH meets BCH...

While Sagebooks's office isn't exactly a secret agency, it still uses a bunch of code names for efficiency. For example, they use the abbreviation BCH instead of "Basic Chinese 500".

Unexpectedly, a few days ago, while casually reading a book, I came across the name BCH in the chapter on QR codes in a coding book! It immediately piqued my interest and curiosity. Upon closer reading, I learned that BCH is an abbreviation of the names of three scientists (Bose, Chaudhuri, and Hocquenghem). The mathematical error-checking method they developed in 1959-60 was later applied to QR codes.

Aha! Sagebooks's BCH is for teaching children to recognize Chinese characters; while the coding BCH is used to retrieve digital information. But from these two seemingly unrelated "BCH"s, I actually saw four subtle commonalities.

Similar to: Image Recognition

Computer OCR identifies different Chinese characters by using an array of pixels.

BCH teaches children to recognize the appearance of Chinese characters. When children learn: wood, fire, hand, initially, they distinguish them one character at a time. Gradually, the efficiency of children's brains in recognizing familiar Chinese characters increases, and they can recognize different characters at a glance. This is the image recognition of the human brain.

Similarity Two: Modularization, From Simple to Complex

Programming, data structures, engineering systems, etc., are all composed of smaller, simpler unit modules, making the final complex system easier to understand and manage.

Similarly, Chinese characters are also composed of different commonly used components. While radicals are certainly a type of module, many different components are also modules. As children gradually learn to recognize:

They can understand: I can use the components I already know to identify, disassemble, and even deduce some new characters, instead of having to learn from scratch every time.

With proper guidance, this can actually build a very important foundation for their computational thinking.

Similarity Three：Individual words combine to form higher-level meaning

A child just beginning to learn to read might read: "Xiao Ming / go to / the park."

However, when a slightly older child reads: "Xiao Ming walks out the door carrying an umbrella..."
...before even reading the next sentence, various hypotheses naturally form in his mind:
Why is he carrying an umbrella?
Is it raining right now?

Or is it about to rain?
Where is he going?

This young reader’s activity has moved beyond the mere recognition of words. His brain is progressing from "identifying the symbols before his eyes" to "building a model based on known information and inferring information that has not yet appeared."

Similarity Four：Error Detection

As mentioned earlier, the algorithm developed by the three BCH scientists was designed for error detection. BCH codes were subsequently adopted in numerous digital communication and storage technologies; even the QR codes we use daily employ BCH codes within certain data structures to assist in detecting and correcting errors.

Let us return to the young reader mentioned earlier. When he sees the sentence, "Xiao Ming wore an umbrella to school today,"

he might wonder, "That doesn't sound right, does it?" Without needing anyone to teach him, his accumulated linguistic knowledge tells him that we typically "carry" or "hold up" an umbrella. Interestingly, the error within that sentence conveys information in itself.

Two approaches to BCH decoding—different paths, same destination.

Digital decoding is a process that moves from bits to formatted code, detects anomalies, locates errors, and finally retrieves information.

When we read, we undergo a similar process: moving from symbols (characters) to patterns (syntax), relationships, and context, ultimately arriving at meaning.

The common thread in both is the extraction of intended information from received signals.

The BCH foundational Chinese character program lays a solid groundwork for children’s literacy, helping them gradually evolve into capable young readers. As their brains and minds mature, they develop skills such as reasoning, comparison, hypothesis formation, and error detection, while also learning to consider issues from multiple perspectives. As we face the future era of AI, the following realization is crucial:

 Sometimes, an error is not merely something to be eliminated; it can serve as a clue, a message, or even a starting point for reinvention.

In the world of "Shaolin Chinese", errors often provide the vital clues, messages, and new beginnings needed to uncover the truth and solve problems.

•  Ah-Te discovered the truth behind a campus theft by noticing a discrepancy in footprints.
•  Zhi Yan exposed Qifu’s trickery by using mathematical deduction to analyze the improbably high success rate of his "prophecies."
•  Cun Mei did not view the defaced exterior wall of the flower shop as an "error" that had to be erased; instead, she incorporated the chaotic splotches of paint into a new design, transforming the vandalism into an even more beautiful floral mural.

In the world of Shaolin Chinese, beyond the level of the characters themselves, readers can also join the characters in...

Discovery > Decomposition > Identifying Connections > Reasoning > Anomaly Detection > Re-verification > Understanding

Cultivate computational thinking and a scientific mindset through a reading journey full of twists and turns.

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