Last Segment of this Large Blog Entry
Hello to all,
This is the third segment of that same long blog entry. As always, please enjoy.
Monday, March 4
That was the official first day of school. I felt like I had just started to get used to the routine, and I knew it would change once school really got under way, but I wasn't exactly prepared mentally for what that entailed. The first day was a big event. One of the teachers made a speech and everything. I experienced a bit of sensory overload and not knowing where to go or what to do at times. I got a bit overwhelmed with the amount of people in the school for such a big day. Often a large group blocked part of the hall or some of the rooms, so trying to figure out how to get around them was confusing. I really don't like bumping into people, and feel especially bad if I almost knock a kid over or trip them with my cane. The school echos quite a bit, so the sound of their voices felt like it was being magnified, thus resulting in my hesitation and uncertainty. I wasn't familiar with the schedule, so I just tried to go with the flow. Much of the time was spent in my new classroom where I went back to my standby of observing the structure of the day. I sang a "Good Morning" song--Incidentally the same version that the Blind Children's Learning Center kids sing--which involves going around the table from child to child, greeting each one with "Good morning!" and asking each how they were doing, all in English. They also get to feel a Braille calendar and learn the English day, month and year. This is part of their daily activities. I also got to help one of the students learn English Braille--specifically his ABC's. They teach the kids using the slate and stylus before they get to use the Perkins Brailler. In a way, this is good, but it isn't very effective when it's time to check the student's progress. My student--Rickey--could use the slate and stylus quite well, but he wasn't writing "a b c d" as he was instructed, but rows of P's and Q's instead. Whoever taught him to mind his P's and Q's taught him well. Haha, couldn't help it. I like puns and things, and that one just came to mind. For those who don't know, the slate and stylus is the blind person's pencil, just as the Brailler is compared to a typewriter. The slate is longer than a normal 8.5 by 11 inch piece of paper--maybe about 11 inches long--and rectangular in shape, and the standard size has 4 rows of little rectangular windows spanning its width. Braille paper is thicker than printing paper as well. We have the standard 8.5 sheets, but we also have 11 by 11 inch paper. Picture index cards the size of a page and you have a pretty good idea of what Braille paper feels like. The slate is usually composed of 2 pieces of either plastic or metal with a hinged end. A piece of paper gets sandwiched between the 2 pieces, and then the user can start brailling. Inside each of the little windows are 6 little notches--3 on each side. The pointed metal tip of the stylus lets the user feel the placement of the notches, and so one can combine dot patterns within each window representing an outline of a Braille cell. Dots 1, 2, and 3 are on the right side of each little window, and 4, 5 and 6 are on the left. So one must start at the top right hand side of the paper and move from right to left. When done, the student can open the slate, flip the paper over and read his or her own writing right side up. With the Brailler, it is more straightforward. You write from left to right and are able to read each line of text as you write. For this reason, I had trouble following along with my student as he was writing his letters. He didn't want me taking the slate from him so I could flip his paper over and determine his progress whenever he got distracted. My second issue was that I couldn't tell him--in Chinese--that he wasn't writing the correct letters and so I felt ineffectual. I hope to problem solve this in future.
Tuesday, March 5
That day was a break from my normal routine. I got to accompany Allie and Susan in the city of Beijing--Bethel is located in a village called Doudian on the outskirts of Beijing so I think of it like the city of Los Angeles and LA county but I'm not sure if that's exactly right--and we went to a really nice cafe where a former Bethel student works, operating the juice and coffee machines. I briefly got to meet her just before her shift started, and I hope to get to know her better if we get to meet up again before I leave for home. Susan gave her a mobility lesson, and we all talked about ways we could help make the machinery more accessible. I think I'll get to go back and meet up with her again, and maybe talk to the managers and show them examples of how blindness really isn't a barrier. I think that's part of the reason I get to help out, and I'm glad to see how willing the cafe staff is to work with Bethel. If this works out, they said they'd be open to hiring more blind employees for their other locations, which I think is really neat. The cafe is located inside a mall, and across the way is a little French Bakery, so I went there and bought some stuff for breakfast during the rest of the week. We got back to school just before 3:00, so I went back to spend the rest of the time with my students. That evening, I went to dinner with some of the kids--just the boys--and we went to another awesome barbecue place.
Wednesday, March 6
By this time, I was getting a sense of the schedule and how time was divided up. It also helped that we had a bell installed early in the week, and it helps me keep track of time a little better. At first I thought they were installing a doorbell or a bell that would ring whenever someone opened the main door. My brain didn't even think of a school bell until someone told me that was what it was. That afternoon, I spent some more time with little Madeline. That was the day I got to hear her nice, clear singing voice. My mind was focused on home that particular Wednesday. I wasn't necessarily homesick, but I missed being a part of Ash Wednesday at church. At the same time, I couldn't believe I'd been in China for almost 3 weeks already.
Thursday, March 7
I think we had our first English class that day. Both Maddie and I were there. We taught the kids how to count to 20 and each student got to try counting by themselves after we practiced the numbers together. We also went into the panda classroom and sang some educational English songs with the kids there. For the first few weeks, I was partnered with Zoe, but lately I've been sitting next to 2 newer kids, across from her. I would try to make the songs more engaging for her by clapping in rhythm with her or holding her hands and moving them from side to side. I think at first, whenever she heard me coming, she would think I was there for some play time, so I had to make sure she stayed in her seat during class time.
Friday, March 8
Friday was similar to Thursday, aside from the fact that I was teaching on my own for the first time. I continued the counting lesson with the chipmunk kids, counting up to 10 and then doing something new and counting backward. Then we did a counting song, and another called "One Little Finger" which basically has the kids tap their finger, move it up and down and put it on their head, nose, ETC. So that lesson went pretty well, all things considered. I was a bit nervous though. I went back to the panda room and sang more songs with them as well. I prepared a playlist beforehand, so I was able to find the songs I needed much faster than if I had to search for them one by one. Just before lunch time, I had a mini lesson with Rickey and little Madeline. It was hard to get them to focus because Rickey wanted to just sing songs, not learn about body words, and whenever he would start singing what we call the Hello Song, little Madeline would join in. It was cute and one of those rare moments when she actually sang louder than usual, but I had to hide how much I wanted to laugh despite their antics. I settled for getting them to clap their hands and played that song and others that they could clap to. I mostly gave in because Rickey was getting up off his seat and would have escaped downstairs if I hadn't caught him part of the way down and tugged gently on his hand to get him to come and sit down again. I was successful with that at least. I had every intention of going into the Caterpillar classroom in the afternoon and singing songs with them, but I was told we didn't have any classes on Friday afternoons, that the kids could just play, so I didn't work with those kids until the Monday after that.
Saturday and Sunday, March 9 and 10
I enjoyed my weekend. It was fairly quiet. I briefly went to the school for about an hour or 2 each day, and played with Zoe on Saturday and Grace on Sunday. On Sunday, Susan and I went back to that second barbecue place for lunch, but we took only 2 of the boys and all of the girls got to come with us this time. Instead of having their barbecue items, we chose to do a hot pot meal. It was really neat, and of course my favorite part was the meat. Susan took me to the grocery store again. I've found quite a few snacks and drinks here that they don't have in the US, and have already found my favorites. After that, Susan taught me how to use the washing machine, and I spent the rest of Sunday doing nearly a month's worth of laundry. Most people here don't use dryers, so I had to hang my clothes up to dry.
Monday and Tuesday, March 11 and 12
Monday went pretty well. The kids learned some more body words and got to play with a little wooden manikin and identify where its arms, feet, head, hands and stomach were. After lunch, Susan came to see me and gave me a little steamer to use at the apartment. I had a bit of frozen food I bought a while ago, and she told me how to make it. I know what this food item is called for a change, but I don't know how to spell it. They're like... these little half-ball shaped, bread-like things. People put different things inside them--pork, vegies, chicken, red bean paste--you name it. A few weeks before that day, someone made them to have with our lunch meal, and I quickly became addicted to them. Allie helped me find some frozen ones, and now I can make them! I'm so excited! Susan also promised to teach me how to make hot pot meals. During our lunch and nap time period--which is 2 hours long--Susan taught me how to get from my apartment to the grocery store nearby. We also asked the store employees for their help on the days when I might come in by myself. I made a list of things I might want from that store, and Susan gave me a copy of the list written in Chinese. So now I can go on my own. It's my next step in being as independent as I can. It's really exciting and liberating too. We taught for the first time in the Caterpillar room. That went well. Grace actually walked over and found me sitting on the other side of the table from her, so I spent part of the lesson with her. She was very excited, jumping at times and leaning her head on me, waiting for me to kiss the top of it. Just before the end of the school day, I got to play with Timmy. He made his airplane fly and land on my head, shoulder or hand. He enjoys when I pick him up, bounce him around, count to 5, then slant my legs into the shape of a slide. Sometimes I make him land slowly and gently, other times he lands with a quick plop. His laugh is infectious. On Tuesday, the older kids learned the "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" song, and I got to work with little Madeline again. I'm also slowly getting acquainted with some of the scholarship students. One of them--Xixi--sometimes cries when her parents leave her. Whenever I see her quietly crying, I want to hug her, but am not quite sure if she's okay with that. Another new girl--Zishao--is super curious about my clothes. I guess it was because I'd been wearing fuzzy or velvety things for a few days in a row. She loves to feel soft fabric, and has taken a particular liking to my fuzzy sweater. We are using my playlist of songs for both the Panda and Caterpillar lessons, and playing it in the same order every time so the kids get used to the routine and hopefully really learn the songs. Maddie took me to the craft area and told me what supplies were in each of the drawers. I had planned to have our first art lesson that Friday afternoon, but the kids got to go for another swim day which was unexpected. Things like that happen quite often here. A commonly repeated saying around here is "Yep, that's China for you." Sometimes we don't get much advanced warning when something is about to change in the plans for that day.
This entry feels so rushed, like I didn't take time to focus on some other observations I've made during these past weeks. I'm pretty sure they'll come back to me, so I'll add them to one of my future posts. I'm so sorry to have kept everyone waiting so long for this huge installment. Each day is so full and lively that I usually come home and go to bed early so I can wake up at 5:00 every morning. I usually use that time to pray and/or talk to people in the US. In another one of my future posts, I plan to describe the many different ways that folks can pray for the kids and staff here, but until then, I will bid you all farewell.
This concludes the large entry that you have all waited so long to read. Expect some new content from me within the next week. Pray that my tech issues don't crop up again. I think I've solved the problem, but prayer can never go amiss.
Take care folks.
This is the third segment of that same long blog entry. As always, please enjoy.
Monday, March 4
That was the official first day of school. I felt like I had just started to get used to the routine, and I knew it would change once school really got under way, but I wasn't exactly prepared mentally for what that entailed. The first day was a big event. One of the teachers made a speech and everything. I experienced a bit of sensory overload and not knowing where to go or what to do at times. I got a bit overwhelmed with the amount of people in the school for such a big day. Often a large group blocked part of the hall or some of the rooms, so trying to figure out how to get around them was confusing. I really don't like bumping into people, and feel especially bad if I almost knock a kid over or trip them with my cane. The school echos quite a bit, so the sound of their voices felt like it was being magnified, thus resulting in my hesitation and uncertainty. I wasn't familiar with the schedule, so I just tried to go with the flow. Much of the time was spent in my new classroom where I went back to my standby of observing the structure of the day. I sang a "Good Morning" song--Incidentally the same version that the Blind Children's Learning Center kids sing--which involves going around the table from child to child, greeting each one with "Good morning!" and asking each how they were doing, all in English. They also get to feel a Braille calendar and learn the English day, month and year. This is part of their daily activities. I also got to help one of the students learn English Braille--specifically his ABC's. They teach the kids using the slate and stylus before they get to use the Perkins Brailler. In a way, this is good, but it isn't very effective when it's time to check the student's progress. My student--Rickey--could use the slate and stylus quite well, but he wasn't writing "a b c d" as he was instructed, but rows of P's and Q's instead. Whoever taught him to mind his P's and Q's taught him well. Haha, couldn't help it. I like puns and things, and that one just came to mind. For those who don't know, the slate and stylus is the blind person's pencil, just as the Brailler is compared to a typewriter. The slate is longer than a normal 8.5 by 11 inch piece of paper--maybe about 11 inches long--and rectangular in shape, and the standard size has 4 rows of little rectangular windows spanning its width. Braille paper is thicker than printing paper as well. We have the standard 8.5 sheets, but we also have 11 by 11 inch paper. Picture index cards the size of a page and you have a pretty good idea of what Braille paper feels like. The slate is usually composed of 2 pieces of either plastic or metal with a hinged end. A piece of paper gets sandwiched between the 2 pieces, and then the user can start brailling. Inside each of the little windows are 6 little notches--3 on each side. The pointed metal tip of the stylus lets the user feel the placement of the notches, and so one can combine dot patterns within each window representing an outline of a Braille cell. Dots 1, 2, and 3 are on the right side of each little window, and 4, 5 and 6 are on the left. So one must start at the top right hand side of the paper and move from right to left. When done, the student can open the slate, flip the paper over and read his or her own writing right side up. With the Brailler, it is more straightforward. You write from left to right and are able to read each line of text as you write. For this reason, I had trouble following along with my student as he was writing his letters. He didn't want me taking the slate from him so I could flip his paper over and determine his progress whenever he got distracted. My second issue was that I couldn't tell him--in Chinese--that he wasn't writing the correct letters and so I felt ineffectual. I hope to problem solve this in future.
Tuesday, March 5
That day was a break from my normal routine. I got to accompany Allie and Susan in the city of Beijing--Bethel is located in a village called Doudian on the outskirts of Beijing so I think of it like the city of Los Angeles and LA county but I'm not sure if that's exactly right--and we went to a really nice cafe where a former Bethel student works, operating the juice and coffee machines. I briefly got to meet her just before her shift started, and I hope to get to know her better if we get to meet up again before I leave for home. Susan gave her a mobility lesson, and we all talked about ways we could help make the machinery more accessible. I think I'll get to go back and meet up with her again, and maybe talk to the managers and show them examples of how blindness really isn't a barrier. I think that's part of the reason I get to help out, and I'm glad to see how willing the cafe staff is to work with Bethel. If this works out, they said they'd be open to hiring more blind employees for their other locations, which I think is really neat. The cafe is located inside a mall, and across the way is a little French Bakery, so I went there and bought some stuff for breakfast during the rest of the week. We got back to school just before 3:00, so I went back to spend the rest of the time with my students. That evening, I went to dinner with some of the kids--just the boys--and we went to another awesome barbecue place.
Wednesday, March 6
By this time, I was getting a sense of the schedule and how time was divided up. It also helped that we had a bell installed early in the week, and it helps me keep track of time a little better. At first I thought they were installing a doorbell or a bell that would ring whenever someone opened the main door. My brain didn't even think of a school bell until someone told me that was what it was. That afternoon, I spent some more time with little Madeline. That was the day I got to hear her nice, clear singing voice. My mind was focused on home that particular Wednesday. I wasn't necessarily homesick, but I missed being a part of Ash Wednesday at church. At the same time, I couldn't believe I'd been in China for almost 3 weeks already.
Thursday, March 7
I think we had our first English class that day. Both Maddie and I were there. We taught the kids how to count to 20 and each student got to try counting by themselves after we practiced the numbers together. We also went into the panda classroom and sang some educational English songs with the kids there. For the first few weeks, I was partnered with Zoe, but lately I've been sitting next to 2 newer kids, across from her. I would try to make the songs more engaging for her by clapping in rhythm with her or holding her hands and moving them from side to side. I think at first, whenever she heard me coming, she would think I was there for some play time, so I had to make sure she stayed in her seat during class time.
Friday, March 8
Friday was similar to Thursday, aside from the fact that I was teaching on my own for the first time. I continued the counting lesson with the chipmunk kids, counting up to 10 and then doing something new and counting backward. Then we did a counting song, and another called "One Little Finger" which basically has the kids tap their finger, move it up and down and put it on their head, nose, ETC. So that lesson went pretty well, all things considered. I was a bit nervous though. I went back to the panda room and sang more songs with them as well. I prepared a playlist beforehand, so I was able to find the songs I needed much faster than if I had to search for them one by one. Just before lunch time, I had a mini lesson with Rickey and little Madeline. It was hard to get them to focus because Rickey wanted to just sing songs, not learn about body words, and whenever he would start singing what we call the Hello Song, little Madeline would join in. It was cute and one of those rare moments when she actually sang louder than usual, but I had to hide how much I wanted to laugh despite their antics. I settled for getting them to clap their hands and played that song and others that they could clap to. I mostly gave in because Rickey was getting up off his seat and would have escaped downstairs if I hadn't caught him part of the way down and tugged gently on his hand to get him to come and sit down again. I was successful with that at least. I had every intention of going into the Caterpillar classroom in the afternoon and singing songs with them, but I was told we didn't have any classes on Friday afternoons, that the kids could just play, so I didn't work with those kids until the Monday after that.
Saturday and Sunday, March 9 and 10
I enjoyed my weekend. It was fairly quiet. I briefly went to the school for about an hour or 2 each day, and played with Zoe on Saturday and Grace on Sunday. On Sunday, Susan and I went back to that second barbecue place for lunch, but we took only 2 of the boys and all of the girls got to come with us this time. Instead of having their barbecue items, we chose to do a hot pot meal. It was really neat, and of course my favorite part was the meat. Susan took me to the grocery store again. I've found quite a few snacks and drinks here that they don't have in the US, and have already found my favorites. After that, Susan taught me how to use the washing machine, and I spent the rest of Sunday doing nearly a month's worth of laundry. Most people here don't use dryers, so I had to hang my clothes up to dry.
Monday and Tuesday, March 11 and 12
Monday went pretty well. The kids learned some more body words and got to play with a little wooden manikin and identify where its arms, feet, head, hands and stomach were. After lunch, Susan came to see me and gave me a little steamer to use at the apartment. I had a bit of frozen food I bought a while ago, and she told me how to make it. I know what this food item is called for a change, but I don't know how to spell it. They're like... these little half-ball shaped, bread-like things. People put different things inside them--pork, vegies, chicken, red bean paste--you name it. A few weeks before that day, someone made them to have with our lunch meal, and I quickly became addicted to them. Allie helped me find some frozen ones, and now I can make them! I'm so excited! Susan also promised to teach me how to make hot pot meals. During our lunch and nap time period--which is 2 hours long--Susan taught me how to get from my apartment to the grocery store nearby. We also asked the store employees for their help on the days when I might come in by myself. I made a list of things I might want from that store, and Susan gave me a copy of the list written in Chinese. So now I can go on my own. It's my next step in being as independent as I can. It's really exciting and liberating too. We taught for the first time in the Caterpillar room. That went well. Grace actually walked over and found me sitting on the other side of the table from her, so I spent part of the lesson with her. She was very excited, jumping at times and leaning her head on me, waiting for me to kiss the top of it. Just before the end of the school day, I got to play with Timmy. He made his airplane fly and land on my head, shoulder or hand. He enjoys when I pick him up, bounce him around, count to 5, then slant my legs into the shape of a slide. Sometimes I make him land slowly and gently, other times he lands with a quick plop. His laugh is infectious. On Tuesday, the older kids learned the "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" song, and I got to work with little Madeline again. I'm also slowly getting acquainted with some of the scholarship students. One of them--Xixi--sometimes cries when her parents leave her. Whenever I see her quietly crying, I want to hug her, but am not quite sure if she's okay with that. Another new girl--Zishao--is super curious about my clothes. I guess it was because I'd been wearing fuzzy or velvety things for a few days in a row. She loves to feel soft fabric, and has taken a particular liking to my fuzzy sweater. We are using my playlist of songs for both the Panda and Caterpillar lessons, and playing it in the same order every time so the kids get used to the routine and hopefully really learn the songs. Maddie took me to the craft area and told me what supplies were in each of the drawers. I had planned to have our first art lesson that Friday afternoon, but the kids got to go for another swim day which was unexpected. Things like that happen quite often here. A commonly repeated saying around here is "Yep, that's China for you." Sometimes we don't get much advanced warning when something is about to change in the plans for that day.
This entry feels so rushed, like I didn't take time to focus on some other observations I've made during these past weeks. I'm pretty sure they'll come back to me, so I'll add them to one of my future posts. I'm so sorry to have kept everyone waiting so long for this huge installment. Each day is so full and lively that I usually come home and go to bed early so I can wake up at 5:00 every morning. I usually use that time to pray and/or talk to people in the US. In another one of my future posts, I plan to describe the many different ways that folks can pray for the kids and staff here, but until then, I will bid you all farewell.
This concludes the large entry that you have all waited so long to read. Expect some new content from me within the next week. Pray that my tech issues don't crop up again. I think I've solved the problem, but prayer can never go amiss.
Take care folks.
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