<p>Ancient Greek is also tonal. So are many African languages. Should classical students of ancient Greek get placed into heritage Chinese too?</p>
<p>Also the Chinese languages (Hakka, Hokkien, Min-nan, Cantonese, Wu, etc.) which are often wrongly called “dialects” are quite different of Mandarin. Think of the difference between German and English. That’s how far the Chinese languages tend to be apart on average. Why should you get placed in a heritage German class because you speak English?</p>