Education China Project #21864

Help a village care for its left-behind children

by OneSky

Project Report | Apr 25, 2017
A Village Teacher - "Everybody's welcome in this classroom!"

By Karin Evans | Executive Editor

Thank you for supporting our work on behalf of children of migrant parents in rural China! Here is an update about a very special teacher in our village program.

Li Xiyan has been teaching in a OneSky preschool for more than a year during which she’s learned that education in China’s rural villages is a family affair.

Xiyan herself grew up in a big family in a nearby village where she still lives with her extended family— her husband and four-year-old daughter, plus a grandmother in law, parents in law, and sister in law. When OneSky came to her village to recruit, Xiyan jumped at the chance. One reason was her little daughter. “I didn’t know how to educate her well,” she says. “I wanted to learn.” Xiyan’s previous training as a bridge crane operator and in a steel factory had been far from a preschool classroom.

But once Xiyan began working with OneSky’s Teacher Trainer Du Xiurong, she was on her way. “I told myself there was nothing I couldn’t do if I made up my mind.” Soon Xiyan walked into her first classroom. She had learned how to observe and help children, how to establish emotional ties with them. “I had learned to be patient and persistent and to never give up on a child.”

Still, on her very first day in the classroom, back in April 2015, Xiyan recalls, “I was so nervous I almost forgot what to say! My voice was shaking.”

Within a couple of weeks, with the support of other teachers, Xiyan had overcome her nervousness, and was feeling comfortable with her class of 20 five and six year-olds. “I knew I needed to make the children feel how much they are loved. I also learned that to be a qualified teacher, I had to feel confident about myself.”

Although she has a daily teaching routine, Xiyan has learned to be flexible, because there are always surprises. She plans her lessons the night before, and comes early in the morning to clean and organize her classroom so everything is sparkling and ready when the children file in.

The day begins with morning exercises, to get all the children moving and energized. Then, before organized activities, the children have some free time—to greet each other, settle in, maybe choose an activity they would like to try later. All the while Xiyan observes each child, making sure everyone is participating happily, watching to see if any child seems troubled, or if anyone isn’t feeling well.

Morning lessons in math, reading, and writing follow, with breaks for snacks and group discussions. There’s also drawing and singing, and time outside to play with friends and run off steam. Xiyan says the children love going out of doors, so she plans time outside whenever she can. In spring, the children love to plant watermelon and sunflower seeds, tend them, and then watch with excitement for the first green leaves to appear.

Whatever the activity, Xiyan pays close attention to each student. When a new child, a very quiet little boy, came to class, Xiyan asked what he would like to draw. “A tortoise,” the boy answered, so Xiyan set him up to do that. After he finished, she gently asked him about his drawing, but he didn’t want to talk about it. She noticed that he listened carefully, though, and she was confident he would open up, given time and attention.

A harder challenge was posed by the adults. At first, some of the village parents and grandparents found the school activities hard to understand. When they saw a group of children outside watering plants, for instance, it didn’t look like the kind of school activity they were used to! And shouldn’t the children be writing Chinese characters and not drawing tortoises?

Xiyan’s answer was to invite the adults to come to school, too. “They thought the children just played all day, and I began to feel frustrated.” Because most of these children are left-behind children, whose parents are away in the city working, it’s the grandparents who send them to school. So she invited the grandparents to come try out the school themselves. This way they could get an idea of the daily routine.

“What’s even better,” says Xiyan, “they could see their children’s happy faces and see how much they were learning and growing.” After the classroom was opened up, some of the grandparents put aside their farm work and accompanied the children to class and even did handiwork with the kids. The result was that they gradually accepted the OneSky approach.

“This made me very, very happy,” says Xiyan. “Before our preschool opened, most children had studied outside the village. But now more and more families are bringing their children here to study.

“Every day is a brand new day for me,” says the young teacher. “I always want to improve and help the children more. My happiest moments are when the children are happy.”

And here’s something really interesting, she adds: “I’ve noticed that the grandparents have changed. When they came to school to pick up their children their first question used to be, ‘Do you have any homework today? You better get started!’ Now, they say, ‘Did you have a nice day at school today? What was your favorite game?’

“They see how much the children are learning, and how much enjoyment they are having at the same time. That makes me very happy, too!”

Permalink

Jan 26, 2017
Our Paradise in the Woods

By Patricia King | Chief Communications Officer, OneSky

There are three components to OneSky’s model for children in villages and each is equally important: the early learning center, family skills training for caregivers, and community engagement.

It’s not easy to find ways to heal rural villages disrupted as young parents leave home to seek work in distant cities. Our community engagement team seizes every opportunity. In one village, they enlisted the help of OneSky preschool teachers and family mentors and managed to bring the whole community together to create a summer paradise for the children.

The plot of land they chose was one frequented by villagers seeking a bit of shade on hot summer days. When they approached the landowner with their idea, he was so enthusiastic that he broom-cleaned the whole area himself.

“It is such a good deed you are doing!” he said. “I’ve never known anyone who would make every effort to help our children just like that. I’m happy to do my part. This place will become much livelier when the children play here.”

By the time the sun rose next morning, word had spread. Villagers arrived from every corner, lugging sand, tires, timber and rags – whatever they could find to contribute to building paradise.

And everyone pitched in to help. They made sandboxes and play structures and tunnels from woven rags. The children couldn’t wait. They were underfoot everywhere.

“Let them help,” our preschool teacher said. “They will learn that they are an important part of our community and that they can make a valuable contribution too.”

“What a happy place our village has become,” said one grandma.

“The children are still too little to know many things, but somehow they know this place belongs to them. They know we are making it for them. And we are making it with our love.”

“That’s all we have to give them,” said a grandpa.

“That is enough,” the teacher said.

Permalink

Oct 30, 2016
Wenzao, Little Hedgehog

By Patricia King | Chief Communications Officer, OneSky

Thank you for supporting our work for children of migrant parents in rural China! Here is an update about little Wenzao, a child in our village program.

When night falls in the village, a little boy named Wenzao crawls into a cozy space at the foot of his grandmother’s bed. There’s a matching spot at the foot of his grandfather’s bed where his brother Hong sleeps. But that spot is usually empty these days. Hong is six years old now, attends school outside the village, and comes home only on the weekends. When his brother is gone, life feels pretty lonely for Wenzao. He’s apt to withdraw and curl into a little ball—or lash out in anger.

Wenzao is not quite four years old. Two years ago, the boys’ parents divorced, bitterly, and his mother left the family. She’s come back only once since then, when she surprised Wenzao at school, and brought him a kite and some clothes.

Wenzao misses his mother, but his brother just looks down and kicks the dirt when her name is mentioned. Hong is old enough to remember a terrible time after their mother left, when their father, who works in a city to the south, was so angry he burned all the family pictures of her.

When the brothers are together at their grandparents’ house, they watch their favorite show together: “Armor Boy.” They like to imitate the superhero’s poses. Strong stance. Fists at the ready. So tough and invincible no one can hurt them.

Wenzao looks forward to his father’s periodic visits. His father does what he can with Wenzao, urging him to behave better, telling him to help his grandmother with the dishes and other chores.

Often the grandparents go down to the river to work, where they stay in another little house on a fishpond. While the grandparents fish and farm and do chores, Wenzao is free to roam. But when a teacher made a home visit and saw the child along the riverbank without any adult supervision, she became concerned. She feared for Wenzhao’s safety as well as his emotional well-being because he is so isolated.

But when Hong is home from school, he, too, goes down to the fishpond while the grandparents work and the brothers play together all day long, running along the river, racing to see who’s fastest. Sometimes there are even quiet moments, when they pretend to be meditating monks! One of Wenzao’s best memories is awaking from a nap to find Hong there waiting for him, ready to play.

Usually, though, Hong is away at school, the grandparents are just too busy, and Wenzao is left alone. So it seemed a stroke of luck to Wenzao’s grandparents when OneSky’s preschool opened. His grandmother prepared to send him off for the first day of school.

It didn’t go well. At first Wenzao cried and refused to go. His grandmother insisted, but once he got to the classroom, he withdrew into silence. He didn’t want anyone near him, and if other kids even touched something that belonged to him, Wenzao flew into a rage. Once he got going, it was difficult to calm him down.

The teachers were concerned. They wondered whether Wenzao might be autistic. At the very least, he was deeply troubled. With his tough exterior, it was hard to tell what was going on inside.

“He seemed just like a little hedgehog,” said his teacher. Like the hedgehog, who rolls into a ball, fending off the world with a show of sharp spines, Wenzao retreated into himself, pushing people away with bursts of anger. He seemed to alternate between having a meltdown, or sitting in a daze.

The teacher watched Wenzao and could guess that a hurt and frightened little boy was hiding behind that scowling face. She knew that the small ci wei—which is Chinese for hedgehog—needed a lot of help. And she knew that her work had just begun.

Permalink

‹ 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 ›

About Project Reports

Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.

If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.