Putting down a pair of mini-scissors and gently opening the folded paper, Olivia, a 7-year blond girl, greeted her first paper-cut works with a broad smile --a big Chinese character "Chun", meaning "Spring" in English, cut out of a piece of red paper.

Although she could not write the Chinese word, she, under the patient instruction from a Chinese teacher, managed to cut a big Chinese character "Spring" and a fish out of a piece of red paper, the first time she did paper-cutting.

"I am very exciting about it," said Olivia. "I'll bring this back home and put it on the wall. Let everybody enjoy it."

She is one of the 30-odd children, ranged from 3-15 in ages, who attended a workshop organized by China Institute in America, the first and only cultural and educational institution in New York with an exclusive focus on China.

Every year around the time when the Chinese New Year's Day is drawing near, China Institute endeavors to make some of the most interesting Chinese traditions accessible to the entire New York community.

A yellow lion and a green lion are dancing in front of the China Institute building. Children and their parents are listening to the stories about the Chinese New Year tradition. Americans are being taught how to make dumplings, known as jiaozi, a small meat-and-vegetable-filled dumplings.

"We are striving to make Americans understand Chinese culture much better," Torrey Whitman, the lawyer-turned president of China Institute. "This is very good for the Sino-American relations."

"Besides paper-cutting, children will be able to write their own New Year's couplet, and listen to stories about the 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac," France Pepper, program coordinator at the China Institute, said.

"These programs are not boring at all, and my children can learn the tradition of the Spring Festival in the process of playing," Zhong Peijun, a mother who stood by while her children were doing paper-cutting, said. "Actually, I don't want my children to forget my culture and tradition."

Much like a Christmas holiday Western countries, Chinese New Year's Day is the most important and popular of Chinese festivals -- a time when families and friends come together to celebrate, a time to remember forebears, pay respect to elders and treat friends and children with gift and money. No matter where one stays, he will manage to get home for family reunion on the New Year's Eve.

Each Chinese year is popularly known by one of the 12 animals of the Chinese Zodiac, and the coming New Year's Day, which falls on February 5, is the Year of Dragon, a year people think will bring good fortune.

Attending the programs sponsored by China Institute, people can enjoy the festival atmosphere ahead of time.

Founded in 1926, China Institute is a nonprofit educational and cultural institution that promotes the understanding, appreciation and enjoyment of traditional and contemporary Chinese civilization, culture and heritage and provides the cultural and historical context for understanding contemporary China.

The institute offers programs, activities, courses and seminars on art, both visual and performing, culture, history, music, philosophy, language and literature, appropriate for people of all ages and backgrounds, as well as children's programming, business and current affairs programs and professional development programs for teachers.

"Of course, being the president of China Institute makes much less money than a lawyer," said Whitman, who began to study Chinese at Stanford University 35 years ago, and later at Oxford University in England. "But I love the Chinese culture very much, and I like to work hard to introduce the Chinese culture to Americans, including the US-born Chinese."

"Non-Chinese people are interested in the Chinese culture, and Chinese Americans are learning Chinese culture to find out their roots," he said.