The
time was September 2009, when our oldest daughter Selena started first grade in
China. We liked a public school that was a well-known local university’s
attached elementary school in Guangzhou.
It was also close to where we lived, so it seemed ideal. I still
have very vivid memories of Selena and I walking the thirty minutes through the
university campus each way every day to school. We talked, laughed and
tried to recite English words along the way. It was fun and we both
really enjoyed our private mother-daughter time. Ms. Li was Selena’s lead
teacher; she was very rigid and controlling. I understood she was also
the first grade teachers’ leader, which meant she led the teachers group and
had direction for all the first grade students in the school. I certainly
did not expect she would try to lead the parents as wellJ!
I decided that I appreciate respect more than leadership from my daughter’s
teacher.
At
this time it was 1 ½ years after we moved back to China. I went online
searching and found a group called Guangzhou Mothers. There was a huge
amount of discussion about schools in Guangzhou and there were ratings of each
as well. There was one top school which listed that It’s mission included
being “student-based” -- this of course,
really caught my eye. In China’s traditional teaching, it is always “teacher-based” -- what that really means is that the teacher
talks the entire time and students listen only and take notes. The teacher is never to be questioned and
even if everyone knows the teacher is wrong, no one will say anything of
it. This school described their approach
as “student-based” which meant that students would discuss topics in different
groups in the class and ask questions with a lot of opportunity for students to
present information themselves. In this school, reading was also highly
encouraged, with most of their students reading a great number of books and
words from first grade. Sounds like a great fit! But how to transfer from
one school to another?
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