A Training for Our Group Home Parents and Teachers

Last week, some of our Little Flower staff had the opportunity to join a training session with Sarah Lee, an accredited Counseling Psychologist from Hong Kong. Sarah Lee has experience in working at university, schools and non-government organizations.

During her first two days with us, she worked with our Beijing Group Home foster parents. Most of our parents have raised their own children who have grown up and moved out of the house. Though they're experienced parents, they don’t have backgrounds in social work, psychology, or medicine. Our Group Home manager and our staff are constantly supporting our foster parents and the children in their care, but the types of training provided by volunteers like Sarah are a wonderful supplement, to help them further understand the psychological support the children might need.

A group picture with psychologist Sarah Lee, all of our Beijing Group Home foster parents, Little Flower Childcare Operations Manager Tang Xia and Group Homes Manager Ruth Liu. 

The training session with Sarah developed more and more into a vibrant dialogue and Q&A round, during which our parents could bring up their biggest questions and concerns. Sarah was a great listener, helping these parents to articulate their thoughts as well.

In addition to talking about the children, this training was a good occasion for an exchange among the foster parents about their own experiences. They devote their lives to these children and the families that they have formed. Of course, when they find that a child in their care has been adopted, it can be a difficult experience. To “lose” a child they’ve taken care of for years is always an emotionally difficult moment. Sarah managed to let the foster parents see this event more positively--to see the adoption as a very positive development for the child rather than as a personal loss.

Dinner at Group Home 1. 

The training on the third day was held at the Little Flower Early Education Center. This time, the teachers sat down at the small tables that their students normally use, and listened carefully to Sarah's presentation. More of an informative lecture than a dialogue format this time, she reviewed the several stages of childhood development, and the changing needs and requirements of children at each stage.

A round of introductions - Sarah with teachers at the Early Education Center.

Learning About Honesty

Every week on Thursday afternoons, the kids get very excited to have “Virtues” class. Wang Ayi, an educator from the neighborhood, gives this special class and covers a new virtue each week. Today, the kids were learning about Truthfulness, or honesty. The children listened with interest. 

First, Wang Ayi asked the students, “What is honesty?”

The kids had a little trouble answering...the question seemed a bit too abstract. Wang Ayi had it covered, though. She showed the kids some pictures and gave examples, explaining that honesty means: "to always tell the truth, even when it's hard."

She showed a picture of a broken vase, a broken window. After showing all four of the pictures, the students knew: if we break something, we should still always tell the truth about it!

Wang Ayi asked, “Do people like othes who don’t tell the truth?”

The children answered, “No Ayi.”

Ayi again: “Do people like people who do tell the truth?”

Children: “Yes.”

Ayi: “Why? Because if they always tell the truth, we know we can trust them.”

Then Wang Ayi led the children in a practical exercise. She brought out some blocks and gave the children a task: take three minutes and use the pieces to build a house.

Everyone immediately got to work, but it was--predictably--chaos! With twenty little ones trying to build one house all at once, they didn't get very far.

The reason: they weren't working together. After three minutes had passed without a house being build, Wang Ayi selected three children who would represent the entire class to cooperate with each other and build the house. She also gave them a big block "foundation" upon which to build it. The foundation had the word “truthfulness” written on it.

After 3 minutes: a nice and stable house!

Then Wang Ayi asked two of the students to help her try to take away the "foundation" of the house without destroying it. The kids soon discovered this was completely impossible. Once they moved the base, the house started to fall.

She repeated the same thing with a few other students. Of course, each time the house would fall down when they tried to remove the foundation.

Wang Ayi explained: A foundation is essential to building a house, just like honesty is an essential foundation of any relationships you build in life. The children seemed pretty enthralled by her conclusion.

To end the class, everyone got a chance to color their own pictures with examples of the virtue, "honesty."

Thanks to Wang Ayi for a wonderful class!

A Trip to the Wildlife Park

Our six Beijing Group Home families recently took a trip to the Beijing Wildlife park, and fun was had by all! Check out some of the photos we took to capture the day.

Very early in the morning, everyone boarded the buses to head to the park. With six families, Little Flower staff, and volunteers, it was a big group! Here's Yi and Ruth, Little Flower's Group Home Manager:

It was early, so some caught a bit more shuteye on the bus.

But others were too excited to sleep!

When they arrived, everyone had great fun seeing the animals, and even blowing bubbles in the kids' play area.

There was even time for some family portrait shots.

Thanks to all of those who helped to organize this wonderful activity!

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!