The Full-Year Asian Language Concentration (FALCON) program was designed for students who need an intensive program in Chinese to make them proficient enough for graduate study. Using L1, FALCON teaches students to express adult concepts in L2. Since good writing requires a great degree of proficiency, it is neglected initially for the sake of a balance between speaking and reading. More time is spent on speaking to help familiarize the student with various dialects and because active speaking develops more language skills than does passive reading. The volume of reading done shows the student the vast difference in style between spoken and written Chinese. Only Chinese is spoken in oral drill sessions, while the native language is used to explain grammatical points and to gloss Chinese words in order to assure that the student fully comprehends the new material. (PJM)