First Day

 

We had an early start, meeting Julia, the foreign affairs administrator, at the school and learning about the various opportunities students have at the college to choose from, such as pharmacist, dental hygienist, chiropractor, and others.  We introduced ourselves and learned more about the Global Volunteer Program, its goals, philosophy, and the twelve essential services.  We met with the president of the school and received a warm welcome from him.  We worked on team goals and came up with three:  to connect with students, to encourage English, and to appreciate Chinese culture. Important safety recommendations were shared by Wang Baoli.  We then assigned jobs to the team:  journal manager, health and safety co-coordinator, free time co-coordinator and final celebration co-coordinator.   We then spent some time planning lessons for the next day.  Volunteers and students arrived to welcome us and they shared some things about themselves.  Some of them did remarkable singing performances and then we spent time conversing with them in English which gave us good insight into their speaking and comprehension abilities which in turn will make it easier to plan our lessons appropriately.