May 2014 Featured Child: Bai

This month, we’re featuring Bai, a five-year-old from Little Flower’s Group Home #6. He arrived at Little Flower in November 2012, diagnosed with developmental delays. When he first arrived, he couldn’t speak very clearly, knew only very simple words, and had trouble expressing his thoughts out loud. In terms of our approach to his treatment, we determined that he would need some help with his language skills and overall development. Luckily, he’s had both the engaging environments of the Little Flower Early Education Center and his Group Home family to help him develop quite rapidly, not just with his language skills, but also his social and interpersonal skills. Though he still has a ways to go, he has shown vast improvement since his arrival.

When he first arrived, he was extremely shy and didn’t have many conversations with others. Today, he’s much more outgoing and likes to talk with his school friends and other siblings from Little Flower Group Home #6. Group Home #6’s foster dad actually comes to the school each day to cook lunch for the kids, and Bai loves seeing him there everyday. Bai is actually quite similar in personality to his foster dad. They’re both very easygoing and love to make others laugh. Here's a photo of Bai with is foster mom:

At the moment, Bai is the third oldest of five siblings in his group home. The others are Ji, Ling, Ya, and Tao. He gets along with his siblings very well. Since he has two younger sisters, he’s grown to experience what it’s like to be an older brother and help look after them.

Well actually, his foster sister Ya, who attends the Little Flower school with him, can sometimes play tricks on him, which may make her seem like the older one. Bai is a very generous kid, who doesn’t mind sharing what he has with others or helping out with chores.

At home one day, the kids were all eating fruit. Each of them had four pieces, and Ya gobbled hers down first. She asked Bai for a piece, and he said, “sure!” But when he turned around, Ya had gobbled down everything!

The Little Flower teachers report that Bai is one of the most active students at the Early Education Center. He loves playing outdoors, running, jumping, digging holes and climbing all over the playground.

He’s full of curiosity and also has a rich imagination. He loves Kung Fu, and can be found having a bunch of imaginary adventures just during the forty-five minutes of recess.

One day, he picked up a couple of sticks and pretended they were a bow and arrow. He darted around the schoolyard for the rest of recess, pretending he was a little archer, off to save the day.

Recently, we found that Bai was having some trouble seeing. This led to a trip to the eye doctor and Bai’s first pair of glasses. He loves his glasses, and is very happy now that he doesn’t have to squint to see. Each day at naptime, he takes the initiative to find a teacher to keep his glasses safe while he’s sleeping, and then collects them after waking up. He can often be found peering over his spectacles like an old wise man.

Speaking of which, little Bai can’t wait to grow up. At naptime some days, when the younger kids sleep and many of the older kids choose to go to the art room to draw, he often sneaks into the art room with his older classmates.

And whenever the students line up to go outside, they organize themselves into two lines: one for the younger kids, and one for the older kids. This little guy refuses to go to the little kid line, and adamantly takes his place alongside the older students.

When he heard about Yang, Shu, and Gong transferring to the Beijing International Bilingual Academy, known colloquially among the Early Education Center kids as, “the big kids’ school,” he immediately wanted to go.

Little Bai took the matter up with his teacher Maria. He walked up to her and announced, “I want to go to the big kids’ class!” Maria patiently explained that he would have to wait before he could attend.

What did Bai do next? He took a little stroll around the room, and a couple minutes later, he approached Maria again. “Okay, I’ve done my waiting. Now can I go?”

Bai has a forever family coming to adopt him soon. He recently received a package with photographs of his family from the United States. He’s very proud and excited to go to America. We’re sure that his imagination and ambition will take him very far when he gets there!