This was kind of hard!

1. What was your favorite food when you were a child? No idea. I was super picky and cooked my own food when my family wouldn't cook something else for me. I know I HATED gravy on my chicken haha. 
2. What’s the #1 most played song on your iPod? Don't really use it but it would be Stuck Like Glue- Sugarland. 
3. What is one of your favorite quotes? "Be the change you wish to see in the world." Ghandi? I think
4. What’s your favorite indoor/outdoor activity? Hmmm   Playing games/white water rafting!!!
5. What chore do you absolutely hate doing? Mopping! 
6. What is your favorite form of exercise? Swimmiing
7. What is your favorite time of day/day of the week/month of the year?  Morning, Saturday, April =)
8. What’s your least favorite mode of transportation? Crowded vehicles
9. What is your favorite body part? Eyes
10. What sound do you love? Children's laughter

If… Questions

1. If you could throw any kind of party, what would it be like and what would it be for? It would be awesome! To socialize?? Idk...
2. If you could paint a picture of any scenery you’ve seen before, what would you paint? Many pictures of places in China
3. If you could choose to stay a certain age forever, what age would it be? Umm hmm these are hard ones... 27? So I'd have a job and money to spend =p
4. If you knew the world was ending in 2012, what would you do differently? That is personal. =p Eat more chocolate and ice cream I guess
5. If you could choose anyone, who would you pick as your mentor? Elizabeth Smart
6. If you could witness any event past, present or future, what would it be? Joseph Smith translating the plates! That would be so cool!
7. If you could learn to do anything, what would it be? Speak multiple languages 
8. If you had to work on only one project for the next year, what would it be? One project? Hmmm. Journaling? I guess... 
9. If you were immortal for a day, what would you do? These are tough. Go white water rafting on the toughest river I guess. Like the Colorado River. 
10. If you had to change your first name, what would you change it to? I have no idea to be honest. 
11. If you could meet anyone, living or dead, who would you meet? Emma Smith
12. If you won the lottery, what is the first thing you would do? Pay off all my debt and buy myself a nice car in cash haha =p
13. If you were reincarnated as an animal/drink/ice cream flavor, what would it be?  something cute and cuddly, black cherry, phish food
14. If you could know the answer to any question, besides “What is the meaning of life?”, what would it be? Again- personal. Hmm What countries will I travel to in this life? 
15. If you could be any fictional character, who would you choose? Anne of Green Gables

Personal History Questions

1. Have you ever had something happen to you that you thought was bad but it turned out to be for the best? Not that I can think of right now..
2. What was one of the best parties you’ve ever been to? I don't party how most people do. Just saying. 
3. What was the last movie, TV show or book that made you cry or tear up? I cry a lot.  So not too sure.
4. What’s the hardest thing you’ve ever done? Why is it so hard to think at night.
5. What was the last experience that made you a stronger person? Paying for my own college
6. What did you do growing up that got you into trouble? Listened to my sister's bad ideas haha =p
7. When was the last time you had an amazing meal? Ribs... sooo good! A few weeks ago
8. What’s the best/worst gift you’ve ever given/received? I love my kindles! Yes I have 2 different ones and no I'm not usually spoiled. I'll share my brothers worst gift. It was a placemat.... cut in half. He only got half of it hahhahhaahh. 
9. What do you miss most about being a kid? Not paying bills. 
10. What is your first memory of being really excited? Going to school. I loved school.
11. What was the first thing you bought with your own money? Clothes? Not sure.
12. When was the last time you were nervous? Nervous all the time so today I guess
13. What is something you learned in the last week? That I really don't like teaching middle school 
14. What story does your family always tell about you? When I fell and cut my thigh open on a fence cause it had snowed like 5-6 ft. 
15. At what age did you become an adult? who knows. I still don't think I'm an adult haha

Random Questions

1. Is a picture worth a thousand words? Elaborate. Body language can be hilarious!
2. Where’s Waldo? On the moon. 
3. The best part of waking up is? Folgers in your cup!!! Just kidding coffee is gross!
4. How now brown cow? Dr. Suess?? 
5. Whasssssuuuupppppp? I'm sleepy. 

Can't Wait!

I can't believe that I leave so soon! I spent the day cleaning up the house. Tomorrow I might take off and put all my stuff in the garage to store it. I am living with my cousin and his family. They use my room as an office when I'm not here. I get to see my best friend tomorrow. I can't believe it's coming up so soon. I am so glad! Can't Wait!

Thought I'd include a picture of a wig we found in Dong'an last time I went to China =)

Teaching Schedule

Your teaching schedule could be a bit different than mine. Mine is different than the teacher's before me. It will probably be similar though. 

Your schedule should be the same for every day, Monday through Friday and you will teach all of your classes everyday (I have six classes a day, five days a week). 

They will provide breakfast and lunch for you and a stipend for dinners and weekend meals. (Me, Cierra: Honestly, I most likely won't eat breakfast of lunch with them. I am not a fan of most of their breakfast and get sick of cafeteria food and it made me sick last time...)They will probably want you to be at the school at 8 AM for breakfast. The guards at the gate will give you breakfast (usually some kind of rice milk (YUCK! Don't like it), some stuffed steamed buns (Yum!), maybe a hard-boiled egg (okay), or maybe something from the bakery (yum!)), which you can eat in the guard room. Then at about 8:10 they will probably want you to stand at the front doors of the school to say hello to the kids. At the end of the day they also have you stand at the doors to say bye to the kids. They wanted me to do this everyday, but it seemed a little unnecessary to me to do it that much, so Spencer told me I only needed to do it 2 days a week. 

The kids do their morning exercises and then my first class starts at 9 AM. The first day they wanted me to get up in front of all the kids and parents in the morning during the time they normally do exercises and introduce some kids and do a small game with them. If they have you do this, don't sweat it. Glory (she is your liason) told me exactly what to do beforehand. I had to do this twice within the first week or two. Glory told me I would have to do it everyday, but they actually never had me do it any more than just those 2 times.

 In the morning I'm at the school teaching classes from 9-10:45. I have 3 fifteen minute classes (WOW!!! That's it?) with kids who are about 3 years old. Then I do ten minutes with the "baby" class, which are the 2 year olds. Then I have one 15 minute class with the older kids who I think are about 5-6 years old. Then it's lunch time which you can eat with the teachers at school. I do that sometimes, but often I prefer to go home to eat lunch (I just don't have much taste for the school food, to be honest). 

After morning classes and lunch, I have a break for a few hours while the kids take a nap, (Favorite part of the day!) so I usually go home. Then I have to be back at the school at 2:40 for another 15 minute class in the afternoon with a class of 4-5 year olds. After that, I always go to Glory's class (also 4-5 year olds) and hang out in there for about an hour till school is over. Sometimes she has me teach a 15 minute lesson in her class, but most of the time I just sit in there, talk and play with the kids, or help out if she asks me to do something. School gets out at 4 PM.

 Also, with each of these classes the kids will stay in their classrooms and you will move from class to class. There will always be at least one Chinese teacher in the class, usually more like 2 or even 3. Mostly at least one of these teachers will speak a little English and can help you if you need, though sometimes it is still a little hard to be understood by them, because most of them don't speak English very well. Glory probably speaks the best English of any of the teachers there, so she makes a good liason, though her English is not perfect either. Glory is a really nice person and is definitely willing to help you when you need something. She gets a little busy and can sometimes be a little forgetful, so sometimes you might need to remind her several times about things. However, she really does want to help and does try. She's actually a very sweet person and you can tell she really likes teaching the kids.

Here we go! I leave Saturday!

This was a very long email to answer my questions from the teacher before me at this school explains a little about my daily life =) 

Teaching at your school:

At this school, they will actually tell you what to teach, so you don't really need to come up with your own lesson topics. (This makes me super happy!) Usually it's a group of vocab words that you need to teach the kids. They don't tend to tell you beforehand what you're going to teach that day. They tend to tell you on the spot at the last minute and expect you to just do things and come up with ideas for things without warning or notice. It can be a little frustrating. It was for me, but I learned to work with it. Be positive, ask questions and use your liason (The lady in charge of the foreign teachers)! If you want to be more prepared, ask them as much and as often as you need to for them to give you the contents of the week's lessons in advance. Even then it is good to have some game ideas on hand that can work for anything, in case you get to class and they are not having you do what you expected to do. 

They like you to sing songs with the kids, but it seems to me like they don't want you to spend too much time on songs as opposed to games or just drilling the kids on the words. I usually do a short song with the kids at the beginning of each lesson. It's best to do songs with hand motions and actions (I've done the Hokey Pokey, Do What I'm Doing, One Little Finger, Popcorn Popping, Once There Was A Snowman, and a few others I found online). The kids have more fun with that and remember things better that way (though they can get a little crazy with them sometimes). If you want to do a song that doesn't normally have hand motions or actions, then I recommend coming up with your own actions for it, or at least doing some sort of hand clapping. 

Come up with LOTS and LOTS of games to play, especially ones you can use to teach the vocab words. This was a challenge for me personally and I felt like I ran out of ideas really early on. Brainstorm ideas as much as you can (the older kids love to do Pass it Down and all of the kids like Musical Chairs). Try to keep things simple too if you can. The more complicated the game, the less likely the kids will understand, and the less likely even the teachers will be able to understand the English to explain the games to the kids in Chinese. These kids are so young, most of them don't really understand very well much of what you're saying to them. Also, sometimes the kids can be pretty timid if they are put on the spot, or if they are doing something new that they haven't tried before. Just be patient and have backup plans. You'll learn what works for them and what doesn't just by trying stuff out. Trial and error.

 Also, during the first week, your liason will go to the classes with you and show you what to do and give you some ideas. Try to be as prepared as you can right from the beginning and be confident and assert yourself as a teacher to the kids and to the Chinese teachers.I felt very under-prepared and spent probably the first month just trying to figure out what I was supposed to be teaching from day to day and what they were expecting me to do, before I finally stopped stressing and started having fun with the kids.

 The kids will tend to goof off a lot in your classes, when they don't normally do that with their Chinese teachers, so I recommend figuring out a good way to keep them in check (something I have not done so well at personally, because I was so unprepared), but always remember that they are just little kids, and kids do that. Concerning the Chinese teachers, most of them are really nice and you should try to be friends with them. I kind of felt like some of them were sometimes a little too controlling when it came to my teaching, but I think it's just a little bit of a cultural difference and the fact that you are new to teaching there. I don't know if you'll feel like that too, but if you do, then all I can say is it just takes a little getting used to and just be friendly and be flexible and prepared for anything. 

Most, if not all, of the kids should have English names and most of them should know their English names and be able to tell you if you ask them "What's your name?" Again, they often get really shy and might not tell you their name, but the Chinese teachers should know the kids' English names too, so you can ask them. There are a lot of kids' names to learn, and honestly, I didn't learn them all. I think it would help if you did though. It might make things a little easier while teaching and the kids like it when you know their names. That's all I can think of for the moment about how to teach at this school. These kids really are just so cute. Just try to have fun with them. They like it when you can play with them and just be a fun person. The kids will love you for that.

 A little tip: I taught these kids to LOVE doing high fives and I taught some of the older kids to like doing fist bumps with me as well. The kids will probably try to do high fives with you and will probably often overdo it if you let them, but they just love it when you do that with them. 

Park in Dao Xian

 Sending money to my ancestors =)

 He's asleep in a tree!!!

 Yes random people would come up to use and as us to take pictures with them.

 Their style made me laugh.

 Demon children would not let us get to the apt then threw rocks at the window. 

Dao Xian Moon Caves

This was the first time I made a decision of what I wanted to do and it was very cool!

 Our first time buying train tickets on our own!

 It was very cold!

 So much trash!

 That lady is so strong. Pots and pans in one, baby in another, and pulling a cow!

Moon Caves- So worth finding!

Free day park in Hefei, Anhui (This is where I went on the game show)

 My class!

 I feel into that water. Yuck!

 Random Guys

 First time one a ferris wheel

 This was the building we waited in while we were waiting for our turn to go on the show.