China: Day 23: July 27, 2010 Tuesday

Today I got videotaped with a class that has at times been crazy out of control.

Put a camera in front of them, and they were angels: interested, volunteering, expressing themselves, having fun, enjoying the stories. After the camera crew left, one of the school officials stayed around and she was impressed. Yah!

I told the story of Monkey and Crocodile. The students LOVED that. Then in a couple of class I was able to share Just Enough to Make a Story, the paper folding drawing version. IT was a HUGE hit, even for the 5^th and 6^th graders. I love telling these tales to kids who have never heard them before.

I went to lunch along with a class of high school freshmen who were in a special American culture class taught by one of the teachers. They were going to The Holiday Inn and wanted a couple more people to be part of table time conversation. We had pretty American style buffet (including a GOOD salad bar) and a dessert table. YAH! And serviced with silverware, not a chopstick in sight. Interesting! We got to model for the students how Americans would eat at a buffet. One student was totally puzzled by how to eat a chunk of French bread. She tired to figure out how you would put it in your mouth with a fork and knife. Things you never thing about.

I enjoyed the conversation with the young people. When I asked them about the censorship, such as not being able to be on FACEBOOK (and they added Twitter), they replied they felt it would change. That they were young and could wait.

Back at school to finish the day, and then to the hotel. Plans are still very much in flux as to the closing day’s schedule. Trying to meld east and west in terms of expectations get difficult often. We looked a t a list of possible “awards” to give out to campers and it was suggested that we give awards to the most obedient and behaved, the one who won every game, and most popular. That didn’t fit with what we were trying to reinforcements so we spent times trying to brainstorm new awards.

I was interviewed by our young filmmaker for her video on the teachers. It will be so interesting to see what she comes up with.