Dengzhou Team Presentation Lao Chang Ying Village

1
Dengzhou Team PresentationLao Chang Ying Village

• Team members
• Lili Lai, Yikwan Chu, James Liao, Xiaojie Wang,
  Yvon Wang, Xiaomeng Xu

2
Lao Chang Ying Village Basic Information

• A medium-sized village in Dengzhou, Henan
  Province, with a population of about 3200.
• Not particularly low-income.

3
Our Special Situation

• Lili had already spent 5 months in Lao Chang
  Ying. This affected our decisions and
  interactions with the villagers greatly.
• Our library is community-, not school-based.
• We chose not to give Seedling Fund aid.
• We did not teach English (due to personal
  background and our relative freedom of curriculum)

4
Our Work There

• lots and lots of piksures

5
Community Library I

• What we did
• Catalogued books into categories Literature,
  Society, Popular Science, Children, Composition
  Guide, and Others.
• Recruited and trained a librarian.
• Organized library tours for all schoolchildren,
  taught them library rules.
• Subscribed to several magazines and newspapers.
• Temporarily maintain a non check-out policy.

6
Library II Problems encountered

• Difficulty in recruiting a librarian
• The current librarys environment is not ideal,
  but actual location of library still not fixed
  (miscommunication and power relationships within
  the village).
• Differences between a community and a school
  library (book types, regulations, librarian
  duties, etc.).

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Library III Other reflections...

• Village locals are very supportive of the library
  project. But no one has experience in running a
  community library.
• Dreamcorps should maintain an active role in
  guaranteeing the librarys continuation.
• We should have given more attention to the
  logistics of running the library, i.e. the
  environment, opening hours, salary of the
  librarian, training details etc.

8
Seedling Fund I

• Why we did not choose to distribute any aid in
  Lao Chang Ying
• Highly limited funds
• Relatively sufficient government aid and family
  income to support the primary schoolers
• Necessarily subjective criteria
• Inability to resolve larger or more meaningful
  problems (such as the living fees for senior and
  junior high)
• Maintenance of contact with potential candidates
  in case of dire need

9
Seedling Fund II

• We decided to use our funds (4700) to replace
  the school's desks and benches, which are very
  worn.
• The remaining 3200 of the cost is to be donated
  by the village.

10
Seedling Fund III

• For the future
• More interaction with the junior high schools
  (especially Junior 2), including home visits.
• Encourage volunteers to make personal contact
  with needy families (viz. James's assistance of a
  villager).
• More objective standards in general for selecting
  aid recipients.
• Quality over quantity.

11
Conditions at Lao Ching Ying School

• A primary school built in 1991.
• 13 staff members, 170 students, 6 grades.
• Students have a monotonous academic life.
• Teachers showed more concern in conversation
  about their their wages than the well-beings of
  students.
• Teachers trained to teach only 1 subject teach 2
  students only have 4 subjects total.

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Teaching I

• We decided not to teach English.
• Instead, we taught Music, Art, Dance, Chinese and
  World Geography, and Civics. We negotiated 2
  classes a day with grade 3 to 5 children.
• Organized a flag ceremony (from teaching the
  anthem to organizing the lines).
• We also played games with the children, from an
  icebreaker to basketball and ping-pong.

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Teaching IIField Trips

• Organized 2 field trips to grade 3 to 6 kids on a
  weekend to a nearby woods.
• Picked up trash on the way, talked about
  littering, spitting and the environment.
• A casual conversation on adolescence and human
  maturation for grade 6 students.
• First field trip ever for most students. Fun was
  key songs, story-telling, games, and dances.

14
Teaching III

• We chose to focus on supplementary classes
  because of the lack thereof in the school. The
  students' extracurricular life was also lacking
  in variety.
• We also intended the enrichment courses to build
  the children's confidence and to demonstrate (to
  themselves as well as to the village) their
  hidden potential.

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The Farewell Show I

• Originally we intended for all of the students to
  apply their newly-learned material and buttress
  their confidence.
• In addition, we demonstrated the importance of
  teamwork and discipline to these first-time
  performers.
• The village gave strong support to our efforts,
  and the show quickly snowballed from a school
  concert to a village show.

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The Farewell Show II

• We spent many hours rehearsing during the last
  week.
• The farewell show was received very positively
  and became a village-wide celebration.
  Participants included students, our team members,
  villagers, kindergarteners, performers from
  neighboring villages and government officials.

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The Farewell Show III

• Through the rehearsals, we gained a deeper
  understanding of how much the students lacked a
  sense of responsibility, cooperativeness, and
  discipline.
• The farewell show was the fruit of everyone's
  labors, and was another great chance for
  volunteers to bond with and encourage the
  students.
• It also showcased the students' talents in front
  of their families and friends.

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The Farewell Show IV

• It was a highlight of our team's work in the
  village by attracting media attention and was a
  great way to publicize Dreamcorps' activities.

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Reflections I

• Our situation, once again, differed in that we
  focused on personal and emotional acquaintances
  with villagers and interacted often with the
  community.
• Though we came away with many optimistic
  thoughts, we also have concrete criticisms and
  suggestions for the village, such as a house
  design, improving the villagers' general lack of
  responsibility and social awareness,
  environmental consciousness, etc.

20
Reflections II

• We consider it important that Dreamcorps
  volunteers not only try to change the village
  (an impossible task in 3 weeks), but also learn
  from the community environs.

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Suggestions

• The training was somewhat inefficient. A more
  systematic sort of guide to each specific
  location would be helpful.
• Guest speakers should be centered around
  Dreamcorps alumni.
• The icebreaker was too drawn out. More
  interactivity would be good.
• Guidelines to team leaders on how to approach
  government officials/find ways to know the local
  community better.

22
Further Suggestions

• Language ability, related to culture, should be a
  more important consideration in selecting
  volunteers in the future, for their own sakes.
• English teaching should be reconsidered based on
  local conditions rather than a blanket goal.