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Her, Karen (何慕蘭)
During the trip in Taiwan, I went to teach in Penghu. On the first two days of my time at Penghu, I noticed a lot of differences between there and the city of Taipei. In Penghu, the air was very nice and less humid. The school, Wen Ao Elementary School, was very nice. I remember the various interactive rooms in the building. The school integrated many things into its learning environment. Climbing up the stairs, I would see words, in both English and Chinese, of the different aspects of both American and Taiwanese cultures. The walls were almost all painted, and there were rooms which resembled places such as a restaurant, airplane, hospital, and more. I could see that the teachers cared very much about the learning opportunities for the children, and I was excited to be a part of that.
Creating the lesson plan was an interesting experience. My partner and I were to teach the lowest English level group. It was difficult deciding which topics would best interest the children and not scare them from learning the English language. My partner and I decided to teach them basic greetings for the first day of lessons. The children had trouble trying to remember the phrases, and I began to worry that we had set up too difficult of a lesson. When we gave the pre-test, the kids did not even want to try. I had my worries that the two weeks would be rather long and difficult.
Throughout the first week, my partner and I were busy. We split the work and continuously modified our lesson plan. I noticed a huge transition though; the kids were starting to become more comfortable with us. I loved working with the kids and realized that they were learning a lot more than I realized. Some of my students had trouble with spelling but understood the meaning of words. This gave me more encouragement to do better as my partner and I came up with games that would garner the attention of the kids and hopefully allow them to learn more words.
On the last day of teaching, we handed them the dreaded post-test. We went through the test step-by-step for individual students who still had trouble recognizing the different words. However, at the end, we discovered that not a single student had received a zero, a huge accomplishment since half the students had gotten a zero on the pre-test. I was very sad thinking about our departure the next day, as I had gotten to know these students throughout the two weeks. On our closing ceremony day, we had the students perform a dance to the song ABC. I was very proud of my students for accomplishing so much and happy that I could be with them throughout the two weeks, learning about American culture and new words. This whole experience has been an amazing one, and I’m thankful to have had the chance to work with these kids and meet new people in this program.
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Mitchell, Isauna (陳益美)
The AID Summer Program has changed me as a person. I've learned so much not only about teaching but about myself and Taiwan's culture and people. I feel like I've made a difference in many lives and that makes me really happy. The teaching experience has opened my eyes to new possibilities and I see new horizons. Not only did I teach the children but they also taught me. This experience that I've been a part of has given me so much more than I could have ever expected. I've made lifelong friends and lifelong memories. I've see both sides to learning and the preparation that teachers undergo. I've been in situations where I've been put on the spot and expected to perform. I've been pushed out of my comfort zone but it's helped me become a stronger person and for that I am thankful. I'm glad that I applied for this program and I'm glad that out of all the applicants I got lucky enough to be a part of this wonderful experience.
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Liou, Andrew (劉彥廷)
I thoroughly enjoyed the two weeks teaching at Miaoli Rui Hu Elementary School. The kids were all very friendly and playful. They became the younger brothers and sisters I never had. For two weeks, I became not only their teacher, playmate, and brother but also their role model. I woke up everyday looking forward to a new day of teaching and was sad when school was over. Even though we were lived on the school's campus, I never once felt like I wanted to escape the remoteness of the school. I became accustomed to our living quarters and the slower pace of life became an energizing escape from the hustle and bustle of the city. The two weeks spent teaching English involved doing and learning new things about myself that if not for this experience, I would never have known about myself. While I entered this program with hesitation and skepticism, the friendliness of other participants, staff, and students have made this experience unforgettable and this trip worthwhile.
I enjoyed teaching the kids everyday and have taken back many unforgettable memories.
On the very first day after my arrival at Chientan Youth Activity Center in Taipei, I met my roommates and after unique icebreaking activities, I finally met the five other students that I would be teaching English with. That same evening, I met our group’s counselor and teacher. Over the course of the next week, we became closer as a group attending classes together and brainstorming lesson plans after dinner. What was particularly fun was the preparation for our opening ceremonies. After much deliberation, we decided to perform a dance to Jason Mraz’s “I’m Yours.” We practiced every night and though I am bad at dancing, I enjoyed the time I spent learning the choreography and performing it for the students at the opening ceremony. The week spent training at Chientan felt like an eternity and everyday a drag just to get up to go to class. However, in hindsight I realize that the first week spent at Chientan was essential to our success as English educators in Taiwan. I learned new techniques, strategies, and games that I was able to incorporate in the classroom.
When we all boarded buses to depart for our schools I was unsure of what to expect. I didn’t know what the students and school would be like as well as what the living conditions would be like. My group was the second group to be dropped off on our bus and as we turned down a small road I knew our school must be near. Our bus suddenly stopped at a junction and we were told to get off. There was no school in sight so I was puzzled as to why we were told to get off. We got off because the road to the school was windy and too narrow for the bus. So we all lugged our luggage for what seemed like an eternity but in reality was a short ten minute walk. As the school came into view, I saw the tranquility and majestic qualities of this school. I stopped for a moment to take in where I would be spending the next two weeks. I could picture myself enjoying this place. And I was correct. I thoroughly enjoyed just about every aspect about living there. The living conditions certainly left a lot to be desired, but the students and their energy and eagerness to learn made every moment spent at the school worthwhile.
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Hsu, Sabrina (徐婉庭)
This experience is literally once in a life time. From the classes that we took, to the classes that we taught, to the friends that we have made, everything was fun and unforgettable. However, the main lesson I picked up from this wondrous trip is “First impressions are usually wrong.” My first (well, technically second) impression of Taiwan was wrong. My first impression of this “teaching thing” was wrong. My first impressions of my students were wrong. My first impression of my group members was wrong. I could not have imagined a more different situation.
As this whole experience is not yet over, I cannot definitively say what has been the worst part of it, but I believe I do know what it is: Training week (the only thing worse than that that I can think of is saying good-bye, but let’s not talk about that). What made the training week hard to get through, for me, was the back to back classes, the lack of freedom that we were given, and the fact of having no free time to burn off some excess energy. The whole day was eat, lesson, eat, lesson, eat, sleep, repeat. Because the day was so packed with things to do, it was hard to sit still, but once that week was over, everything became a breeze.
My first/second (this is my second time coming back, but the last time I came back was fourteen years ago, so I do not know if that really counts) time coming to Taiwan and I was worried about everything: the culture shock, my lack of proficiency in Chinese, the fact that I would not really be able to contact my family (not necessarily not SEEING my family, just not being able to talk with them). It was hard in the beginning, but the family that grows here makes up for SOME of it.
After training week, we were off to the school. The students, like most students on the first day of school, were shy, but these were even more so. They were extremely hesitant to answer any questions, even if they were yes or no questions. After crawling through the first day, the six of us were all worried about going through the next two weeks. However, as each day passed, the students became louder and louder and more talkative. They started to open up with us and they started to teach us some of their games and they even made us play our games with them. On the last day, there was on and off rain. Even then though, the students still really wanted to continue our plan of playing with water balloons. Magically, we were able to pick the one period that did not rain and we had a blast (they all ganged up on me at the end, my students or not, because I was not wet ). Despite the parting tears at the end, the students gave me a new found appreciation for teachers and made me realize how in such little time, bonds could be formed so closely.
Lastly, my first impression of people could not be so wrong. Though I felt a gap between my group when I first met them, we are inseparable now. Even though this trip is not yet over, we have already planned trips with each other. Regardless of the fact that this trip was only a month long, I will never forget any of these people especially my new best friend, (who for the sake of privacy will be called “Regina Phlangy” (Yay, Friends!)).
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Tseng, Kevin (曾至穎)
火熱的豔陽高高掛，夏日微風徐徐吹來，知了掛在樹頭唧唧的鳴唱，我的心中似乎有個火山，藏在心裡的岩漿快要滿了出來，四年來的第一次，我回到久違的故鄉——臺灣。在臺灣住了十二年，非常了解臺灣國小的英文教育。六年級時移民到美國才發現學習的方法不只有一種。我才迫不及待得想跟臺灣的小孩分享我的知識。一回到臺灣感受到溫熱的海島氣候，所有小時候的回憶像江水一樣源源不絕得灌回了腦海裡。到了劍潭青年活動中心看到個個興致高昂的同志們，讓我心頭那緊張的結慢慢地鬆開了。過了一個星期的訓練，隊友們變成家人，團結加上愛的力量讓我們勇敢的闖進彰化縣建新國民小學。在那兒的兩個禮拜認識了許多導師和兩位替代役男。我對他們的景仰如同滔滔江水連綿不絕又有如那黃河氾濫一發不可收拾。他們無私的付出激勵了我們八位志工，讓我們每天都有力氣對付精力充沛又好學的小朋友們。雖然只在一起兩個星期，但我感覺到似乎找到了另一個家庭。在與建新國小同學們離別之際，許多志工與小朋友們相擁而泣。我本來打定主意要開開心心的跟小朋友道別，沒想到最後我的淚水還是不爭氣地滑落，我的臉上分不出是努力的汗水還是離別的不捨。今年暑假可說是我過過最充實的暑假。這當然要感謝所有長官和輔導員的努力。最後一個禮拜環島時所有輔導員用心得遵守規定，把所有學員擺在最優先位。分房時長官們細心分配，絕不把住在一起三個星期，度過狂風暴雨，刻苦克難的隊友們分在同一房。只要有機會就一定會把小組拆散，把別組的陌生人跟我們排在一起，讓我們有機會好好地交一晚的新朋友。就算有學員發高燒，嚎啕大哭，輔導員們也遵守規矩，堅決不效仿建新的師長們第一時間護送到醫院。一定等其他四百多名學員用完晚餐才從四十多位輔導員中抽出一人將生病的學員帶往醫院，實在盡責。這個夏天到了個段落，但我們小隊的友情是永遠不會改變。雖然我們分布世界各處，但我相信某年某月一定會在美麗的福爾摩沙再次相遇。
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Liu, Tiffany (劉星蘋)
The past three weeks have been a whirlwind experience. I walked into Chientan Activity Center scared for what was to come over the course of the next month. Would the children like me? Would I be a good teacher? Would I be able to successfully teach the kids English? As it turned out, I had absolutely nothing to worry about. Teaching the students at Chung Der Junior High was an experience that brought me a joy incomparable to any other kind of joy that I've experienced. Who would've thought that my childhood dreams of becoming a teacher would actually come true? When I was younger, I know I looked up to and greatly admired all of my teachers throughout elementary and middle school. They were the biggest influence towards my dream of pursuing education. As high school came around and reality set in more, I turned away from pursuing education to focusing on international business. I didn't think I would get the opportunity to fulfill my former dream, but I did and I am so very grateful. The first few days of teaching was tricky because the kids were still hesitant to participate and were still very shy. They didn't respond during class and would never participate. It was difficult to get the students to be involved. However, over more time together, the kids opened up and became more involved.
The second week of teaching turned out to absolutely wonderful. Now that the students were more open to participating and also talked to us more. It was an eye-opening experience once I started getting to know the students more. It turned out I discovered the reason for wanting to be a teacher. I wanted to be the person who the kids looked up to and admired. I wanted to be the person who inspired, who encouraged, who changed the broken kid to the good kid. I wanted to be the person who let the kids know they were special and important every single day and that I would not give up on them.
Living condition wise I think it was actually a pretty nice experience. We were lucky enough to be placed in a hotel during the two weeks of teaching. The principal and teachers were extremely hospitable and welcoming. They all made me feel welcome and at home. It was something I am very grateful for and thankful for.
Overall, being a part of AID summer was absolutely amazing. It's something that I will never forget and will always cherish in my heart. My students have left an impact on me forever.
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Chen, Yuting (陳昱廷)
This is a rough translation of my closing ceremony.
This turned out to be a really emotional speech for both me and my students, and I hoped I could capture it even if it only in text.
Hello, my name is Yuting Chen, and I am a teacher for Class C. Because my students want me to speak in Chinese, I have decided to give my speech in Chinese.
To be honest, I did not want to come to this program. When my parents told me about it, I said I'd rather stay in America, hang out with friends and go to the movies. But my parents said it would be a good experience since they're both teachers, so I was forced to reluctantly go to Taiwan.
When I first arrived in Huwei, Yunlin, my first reaction was to the scorching heat. But as I stepped out of the car and lifted my head I saw all the students, lined up on the stairs, waiting for me. I was stunned, because I never knew how such a small gesture on my part could have such a large impact on others.
I still remember the first day of teaching, and halfway through the day I said to Teacher Derek "Hey, how much longer do we have?". I was initially only looking to get through the week and enjoy the weekend trips. But as the days progressed, I started to get more and more into the teaching. As I saw my students react to my teaching, I began to devote more and more time into creating lesson plans because I wanted my students to learn and have fun. Eventually, I was telling Derek "I want to this and this, but we don't have enough time for all of this".
Becoming a teacher also allows me to understand how teachers feel. I recall some of my students saying "Oh I hate this teacher" "This teacher called me to his desk to yell at me" "This teacher made me stand outside" "Why can't I have your teacher". I too was like that in middle school, always complaining about my teachers. But after becoming a teacher, even if only for 2 weeks, I can understand from a teachers perspective. Teachers, even if they don't display it outwardly, are always trying to help you succeed. Even if they don't show it, deep down they love you. Or if they don't, at least I love you guys.
While we're on the topic of teachers, I must thank Teachers Joy and Doris for supporting us throughout the last two weeks. Without them, out teaching could have never been this good. Also I must thank Principal Lin for organizing the first ever Youth English Teaching Volunteer Service Program in Huwei, Yunlin. Without her efforts, we could have never gotten this incredible experience.
But most importantly, I must thank my students. Although I am a Taiwanese citizen, I knew little about Taiwanese geography, culture, and history. In two weeks, I taught you guys English, but you guys taught me what it means to be Taiwanese. What you guys taught me is more valuable than any lesson I could have taught you guys in English. I will never forget you guys. Thank you for this. Thank you everybody.
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Ho, Anita (何立蘭)
"Hamburger, cheeseburger, lettuce, and tomato...Hey! Where's the ketchup?" Never in my wildest dreams would I imagine myself singing this song while dancing the Macarena in front of a class of wide-eyed Taiwanese children. Nor would I ever picture myself dancing overly enthusiastically to the song "Let it Go" for a ceremony or using my butt to spell out vocabulary words, all without feeling any shame. Standing in the middle of a field in blistering Tainan heat doing my best to teach third-graders how to swing a bat, running through the middle of a street chasing after a biking student to give her a raincoat, sprinting through a tennis court to deliver boba milk tea to a girl who played tennis several hours a day, my love for the students I encountered at Houbi Elementary was truly immeasurable.
On Monday, when my partner, Maggie, and I faced the Class D kids for the first time, we confronted them with a mouthful of English, only to be met with a room of blank stares...awkward. Yet as the days progressed, we learned the various children's capabilities and limitations, as well as their individual talents and idiosyncracies. In the two weeks, which flew by so quickly like my days in Taiwan, I actually learned a lot too, maybe more than the kids I taught: virtues like patience, care, forgiveness, skills like control, authority, leadership. The generosity we felt was remarkable: daily drink deliveries, delicious dinners, amazing weekend field trips. Thank you to all the students, teachers, and other at Houbi for making my teaching experience in Tainan more than comfortable, fun, and rewarding.
To be fair, AID was not only enjoyable because of the people from Tainan; I suppose, my fellow roomates had something to do with that. Well, maybe a lot. Just like with the students, our group started out as an awkward octet: at the beginning, we could actually go a whole night without speaking. (Japanese dramas, summer reading, and sleepiness probably had a lot to do with that, to be fair) But by the end, as cliche as this sounds, we bonded like sisters: watching scary movies in the midst of a typhoon, fangirling over cute guys, swapping and altering clothes so we could all have matching outfits. Sometimes I felt like I had known these girls before, because we were all so different yet we developed such a tight-knit relationship.
Thank you to all the friends at AID for making my first time in Taiwan so fabulous and unforgettable: roomates, mealtime table-mates, bus-mates, and especially thanks to all the adorable, funny, and helpful 小灰灰 counselors who took wonderful care of us. The past four weeks at AID Summer were some of the most special days I have had: I finally have a collection of beautiful memories in Taiwan, and I know I will treasure them forever.
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Chen, Maggie (陳柔安)
The AID program was a very interesting and unique program. I had my doubts being in an all girl group but it ended up being really fun with a lot of movie marathons and high school musical karoaking. Appreciate the first week at Jientan because the lodging and food is incredible compared to some of the things you'll see on tour week. Albeit long and quite tedious, the training week gives you many ideas of what to do when actually teaching. When my group got to our school (Hou Bi) elementary school, we were still quite unprepared for the classroom. On the first day, our kids refused to use English and were sassier than Simon Cowell. In addition, our teaching plan did not have enough things. Certain activities that we had planned would go till the end of the class period lasted 5 minutes. You have to evaluate your class and adjust to incorporate the games that they are interested in. Also, my teaching partner and I noticed that many of the kids were not participating in our games; it turns out it was mostly because they did not know the vocab well enough. Thus, we made sure to spend more time on teaching so the kids would be confident in their vocabulary skills and would participate in our games. You grow attached to the kids and it's fun to see them come out of their shell and actually start to say English. All the staff and our teacher were extremely kind and kept feeding us amazing tasting food that made us feel like we opened our mouths and ran through a field of happiness. Staying in Taiwan will make you a fat lard. Remember, always use protection! :)DISPOSABLE UNDERWEAR IS MOTHER TERESA.
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Tsao, Sydney (曹家欣)
Two weeks of teaching at Rui-Hu Elementary School have altered my perspectives drastically. As my group was dropped off at a fork, walking distance from the school, I thought “What had I gotten myself into.” At 3:00AM that night, I sat huddled on the couch, panicking as the school cat raced around the living room area. This had not been what I was expecting. Just two weeks later, however, I couldn’t believe it was already time for me to depart from a place that felt like home. It may have been nothing like home in terms comfort, but it sure was home in terms of the relationships I had formed with my students.
No one volunteered answers on the first day of class. No one repeated after me when instructions were given to do so. No one knew the answers on the pre-test. I felt defeated at the end of the first day of classes. The week I had spent planning at Chientan seemed to go to waste. All the lesson plans seemed too challenging for the students. I could not be more wrong, as I made it my goal to teach our kids to love English and fuel their desire to continue learning it. Our class focused on listening and speaking, being able to say and understand a few simple words, and less emphasis was placed on writing and reading.
At the end of two weeks they still weren’t English experts. After all, that wasn’t what I had in mind. However, it was evident that the kids had become more confident in their abilities. Instead of whispering vocabulary words, we all yelled them at the top our lungs together. When, I sat with the kids during lunch they no longer shied away from my questions. Instead, they willingly told me about their families and trips they had taken recently. We laughed together, rather than staring at one another in silence.
The most poignant memory I recall is teaching the “Turkey Song,” which my teaching partner had made up. It was a nonsensical song that went like “Turkey, turkey, so-and-so is a turkey.” Everyone was reluctant to join in as they had all informed me that they disliked both singing and dancing. However, during the post test, it was to my surprise that a great majority of the students had learned what a turkey was. I learned that repetition was key with younger students. Every day during our break period, Teri asked to watch the “Let it Go” video from Frozen. I only allowed her to do so, given that she could tell me the English word, winter. Gradually, she remembered.
Growing closer to the kids made it difficult to separate from them, but I was glad to be on tour week with all of my friends. The bus rides were tedious and the early mornings and late nights were exhausting, but the people here with me on my four week journey made it all worthwhile.
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Huang, Allison (黃姿華)
One of my biggest regrets in college was being unable to study abroad. Coming to Taiwan and being able to participate in AID Summer has helped me fulfilled this wish. Although it may not be entirely the same thing since I was teaching instead of taking classes, I got to be fully immersed in another country’s culture and lifestyle enabling me to experience different things first hand. It was such a blessing going to Beipu Middle School in HsinChu. The principal, staff, and anyone who worked with us such as our host families and teacher assistants treated us with the upmost respect and accommodated to all our needs. I have personally made some unforgettable close friends who I hope to continue visiting in the future.
Training week at Chientan was a necessity to allow me to familiarize myself with my other group mates. I also got to learn all different types of learning games to use for teaching and get a feel for the children’s English levels. Although it started out as a hassle, the teaching plan that we had to make that detailed out everything we needed to do and helped us out in the long run. It gave us a structure and guideline to follow allowing us to provide a focused learning environment and experience for the children.
The teaching started out as a struggle since I’ve only been a student my whole life but it really was an eye opening experience. We lesson planned for the whole weekend before school began, preparing the materials needed for the game and writing the scripts for our plays. The students seemed to be afraid of us and refused to answer any questions we asked. They were shy and nervous about learning English for the whole day when they usually only do it for one period. During the pretest, the students hardly spoke over a whisper when answering our questions but I know they felt relief when they realized we could speak Mandarin as well. As the days went on, they began to warm up to us and open up a little more than usual. They started to enjoy coming to class which made me feel genuinely excited and happy to come teach them every day. The bond between the students and I grew and we soon became friends that played together during break. One struggle I soon overcame was getting prepared for class the next day. My partner and I would stay up late making sure we had the correct materials needed for the lesson the next day. This meant trying to find the correct Chinese characters for the English words we were teaching as well as cutting out flashcards to play charades or Pictionary. I never knew teachers needed to come up with so much content to make a class flow smoothly throughout the day.
The biggest struggle or complication I had to deal with was teaching readers theater and making the students participate in these types of activities. Some students had trouble reading and understanding the English words. This required me to learn how to teach in different ways as well as be patient. Other students understood the play but refused to participate until the principal showed up. In the end the play turned out excellent and the students had a fun time.
I am thankful and glad I decided to go through with this program because I came out with so much more than I thought I would. I came out with fifty students who look up to me as an example as well as 7 other team mates and teacher’s assistants that I have come to cherish. I believe that AID Summer is a wonderful program that allows a person to grow in many different ways while making lasting memories.
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Hsu, Whitney (徐儷庭)
It was a pleasure to be in the AID Summer Program. When I first stepped into Chientan Center, I was so excited to meet new people and ready to start learning how to teach students English. However, the first week was very rough and dull to the point I felt that I was in school again –it was lecture after lecture. Although the classes were not as entertaining, the key points that the teachers emphasized helped me during the teaching weeks. We had a “coach”/teacher from Shanlin Middle School who helped us plan our theme and generalized topics that we would be teaching. Since our teaching theme was “owl” for the mascot of the Bunun aboriginal tribe that was living near the school we were teaching, our teaching and planning mostly had to do with owls. My team also decided we would have the classes compete with each other, like the inter-house competition in the Harry Potter series. We also gave each class an owl species, so my teaching partner, Andrew, and I were to teach the “Pygmy” class.
Then Friday came, and I headed to Shanlin Junior High School with seven other teammates. The first two days I, a city girl, tried to adapt to the country life. It was difficult at first – there were not many places where I could buy things that I needed right away or within walking distance. But that was much of a lesser problem as Monday rolled around and I was to meet my students.
So, on to the actual teaching part of the program – those two weeks were a period of error and trial. Since we did not know how much English that the students knew, the first day were introductions, class rules, getting know the students’ English names, and playing name games. Since we were prohibited to speak Chinese to the students, Andrew and I had a very difficult time trying to get the students to understand what we were trying to say. It was also a hard task to get the students say if they understood what we were saying. We got by the first two days without speaking much English during class time. Thank goodness we had a college student helper who was there to translate things that we were saying in English to Chinese if they didn’t understand.
Seeing that teaching using only English during class was not going to work efficiently, Andrew and I decided that we would talk in English first and then translate the words that they did not know into Chinese. This small change in our teaching brought much better progress in trying to get the students to understand what we were trying to say. They participated more in class. There were more questions asked and more answering replies.
The next difficult part of the teaching was thinking pf games to play. Since half of my class were rising students from elementary school, they became bored more easily while we were teaching the Vocabulary Words for that day. So to emphasize the vocab words they learned, we played many games such as flyswatter, charades, and Pictionary.
To sum up the whole two weeks, it was an amazing experience. Through the two weeks I got to know my students and what middle school students were like these days. I was very lucky to be teaching the eight students that were in the Pygmy class: Ivy, Helen, Peggy, Erica, Molly, Sharon, Tom, Howard. Also I got to meet my TA’s who were like students but a great help getting the students to speak in class and the college-student translator/helper: Ruby, Jason, and Patrick. Hopefully I will be able to visit them the next time I come to visit Taiwan. Thank you for a wonderful experience.
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Jiang, T Loren (蔣天倫)
A flight from Los Angeles to Taipei—this had happened many times before in my life. However, this time was different. I was by myself, ready to embark on a month-long adventure of teaching English, meeting friends, and exploring Taiwan’s unique culture. To be honest, I was extremely nervous, yet excited. I would miss my family and friends back home, but I knew that I would meet an abundance of relatable, yet diverse people. In chronological order, I will reflect on what I consider one of the most meaningful experiences of my life.
The first week of training at Jiantan started off brightly. My roommates Mark, Raymond, Kevin, Alex, and Josh were all so friendly, laid-back, and interesting; we were instantly friends. The opening ceremony was also equally exciting. My Mandarin at the time was a bit rusty, but the event was very welcoming. I was utterly shocked at how many kids there were, a little over four hundred. The icebreakers were a bit childish, but definitely got me excited. When I went to bed that night, I was exhausted, but I knew that the upcoming week would be super fun.
The training lectures were filled with useful information about teaching. Whether it be classroom discipline, teaching tips for rural schools, or interactive activities, I felt that the teachers prepared us well for teaching. I especially appreciated the plethora of fun, useful teaching games shown by both the students and lecturers. However, I feel like the lectures were at times redundant and long-winded, as if the lectures were dragged longer to fulfill the time allotment. Nevertheless, the first week was informative and my teaching partner and I managed to borrow many games and activities for the upcoming two weeks.
As a side note, I really appreciated the organization of the transportation services provided by AID. Everything was timely and well-disseminated. I especially enjoyed the thirty minute flight from Taipei to Magong airport in Penghu.
The two weeks of teaching were frantic, exhausting, and frustrating at times, but so much fun. Michelle Ko, my teaching partner, and I had to constantly revise our teaching plans every night, but in the end, I felt that we choose themes and teaching strategies that truly excited our students to learn English. We taught the themes of theme parks, sports, travel/transportation, and food/holiday. We were fortunate in that our kids were well-behaved and genuinely wanted to learn English. In the end, we didn’t focus too much on ingraining new vocabulary, but rather focused on teaching sentence structure, conversational skills, and American culture. We consistently reinforced these concepts using characters and settings that inspired our kids—things like Disneyland, sports, American cities and food. My biggest suggestion to anyone doing the program next year would be to focus on what kids want to learn. In two weeks, it is not expected for the kids to be fluent in English. Rather, the job of teachers should be to inspire our students with ideas and concepts they love that will motivate them to learn more.
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Chang, Tiffany (張芳庭)
My experience at AID Summer has definitely been one I will never forget. I met so many people and I have definitely been touched by Taiwan and the people I have met here.
During training week, it was very busy and very hectic. I felt stressed simply learning and preparing for the next two weeks of teaching. It was schedule after schedule and due date after due date. I was worried about finishing the working journals, teaching plans, and the daily journals in time. At the same time, I was worried about the opening ceremony at the actual school. I slept really late each night and I was almost delirious with sleep deprivation. Looking back, it was really a waste of time, since we barely followed the daily journals or teaching plans. However, during training week, I really bonded with some of my fellow Bi Tan Guo Xiao teachers. We went from straight out strangers to almost sisters. It really is an amazing experience. The volunteer teachers (shout out to the gray shirt teachers) were also a vital part to my experience. They all worked so hard and I really appreciated all they did for us. They are also incredibly cute and high spirited. I really admire them.
When we left training week, we went to Chia Yi to teach English at Bi Tan Guo Xiao. My first impression of the school was "wow this school is really cute, but those hay people in the front are really creepy." This is the part where it gets really personal and nostalgic. There were people who helped us with our luggage and took them upstairs to our rooms. These people were the soldiers, Sam and Leo. After, we took a tour of the school and looked around the room. The room was definitely a lot nicer than I expected and I am pretty sure I do miss Bi Tan and that room. We practiced hard for the opening ceremony and we did pretty well. The school is amazing and I wish I could go back so much. However, the school at night was very creepy. It was full of bugs and that is not something I am fond of. Other than that, the school really is a wonderful place. The people and staff at the school are some of the nicest people I have met and I really do miss them. The food was wonderful and the people and staff helped us so much. They made sure we were comfortable and on the weekends took us out to the most fun places. It was a blast. I got to make a bag and learn to play the yue ching. The actual school will hold a special place in my heart.
The actual teaching was also a very different experience. At first sight, I thought the kids were adorable, but I was also nervous about how I would have to teach them. Later, I realized the kids really did want to learn English and the majority of them were really hard working. The cuteness stayed with them and some of them became even better students in my eyes, as they really worked so hard. Teaching was also a very stressful part of the two weeks. Preparing material was really not fun and it was hard to gauge what level the students would be at. My teaching partner, Crystal, and I first overestimated what the students would know and then later, we underestimated. In the beginning, Crystal and I definitely had a communication error. We would not really talk and it would be extremely frustrating to prepare material for the next day. I felt as if she was never there and she felt as if we did not have enough communication. We were really dysfunctional and after a while we finally talked it out. The tension went away and we started teaching better. We mutually established a sort of teaching schedule and we worked from that. We repaired/ made a better friendship and I can say we are much closer now than we were during the first week or two of AID Summer.
Speaking of teaching relationships, I think it is safe to say I have made at least seven close friends during this program. Even though we were awkward at first and did not know how to work with each other, we are close now. I feel as if I have had the chance to really talk to each person in my teaching group at least once and I feel as if we have known each other for a while. Though I don't know all the details of their life, I feel as if what I know of them is good enough to make me like them and miss them when we part and go our separate ways. I mean you can't really not miss the people you've lived with for almost a month 24/7 right? I feel as we have our respective little groups within our big group of eight, but we work pretty well together. We get things done and we have a fun time together. I know I will never forget some of the little inside jokes we have. If I do that would be zen de hen bu O.K.. Living with these girls have also affected me. I have slowly picked up on some of their little quirks and I know that when I catch myself doing these things back at home I will definitely feel a nostalgic. It's actually quite sad how much I think I will miss them. I mean we've only known each other for less than a month, right? Meh, maybe I'm weird. I just think it's sad that most of us will never really meet up again after this program.
Back to relationships. The students really have a special part in my heart. I taught level 3 but I still met a lot of the other students in the school. The students accepted me as a teacher and really helped me see a little into my future. (I don't think I'm cut out to be a teacher for the rest of my life, but I certainly do want to be able to change the world and make a positive influence on the world). The students were really hardworking and I appreciate it so much. They loved most the games we taught and really did try to learn the new materials we taught them. I felt we got the closest to them during assembly time. All four levels would come together and learn or do an activity that correlated with what we all learned that day. I met other students and we all got to have fun. I was especially touched when some students would stay with us during break and talk to us. I felt as if they really enjoyed having us there. I was also touched when they would call me Lao Shi in the classroom and Je Je outside the classroom. I really did not know how much I have impacted their lives until the last couple days of school. During the closing ceremony, we performed for the kids and they sat and watched us. We said a quick speech and shortly after, the students enveloped us in hugs. Then the school played a video about our past two weeks and I watched some of my kids cry as I teared up myself. At the very end, the students sang to us and I pretty much cried. I could not sing the song and my teaching group and I were all tearing up. Once they were done, they hugged us again and we took a group photo. If that day did not have enough waterworks, the day we left was even more depressing. Some students had English class on Saturday and they showed up to school to see us off. Even though their class started around 8, some students showed up at 7:00 or 7:30 just to meet us and talk to us one last time before we left them. As we moved our luggage to the car, all the students left their classrooms and watched us get ready. They wanted so many pictures and we took a bunch of pictures. Some kids started crying and I realized that in these two short weeks, we did find a special place in their hearts. Some of them hugged us so long and tight it was hard to keep from crying. When we were starting to board the bus, they all lined up and gave us high fives, but did not let go after the contact. I really started crying so hard. When we got on the bus, the kids really started crying and they waved to us on the bus. I really do miss them so so much. They try to contact us through Facebook and email and I do think it is the sweetest thing ever.
Overall I this experience was definitely one experience I will never forget. The people I met hold a special part in my life and I will not be able to forget them. I have definitely learned more about myself and I never be able to forget all the memories I have made here. I highly recommend AID Summer to everyone and I know it is an experience I will hold dearly to my heart. Thanks for listening and have a good day. (:
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Chen, Grace (陳奕帆)
When I first got accepted into the program, I was stoked beyond belief. This was going to be the best summer ever. I had taught English last year and wanted to do it again because of the unforgettable memories I made last year.
Upon arriving at Jian tan, I saw so many strange faces all excited to do the same thing. I was very worried about my team, if we wouldn't like each other or something. The first week of training was somewhat boring but pretty helpful. I found the best teaching partner, Lawrence. We came up with great ideas together. The lesson plan we made was somewhat useless once we got to school because our class was way smarter than we expected. Every day was a different challenge in class because our students were too smart and we had to challenge them with hard words such as physical therapist, and optometrist. Lawrence and I worked very well together and our team also bonded every night at the house we stayed in. The students were incredibly thoughtful. Many came from troubled backgrounds, such as one child whose parents both suffered from cancer, and another whose parents were divorced. Despite their backgrounds, their passion to learn was boundless and they were always participating in our class, working hard for their prizes and candies. We taught them holidays and how to sing jingle bells. They did an amazing job at the closing ceremony. Today was the last day and we all cried so much saying goodbye to our students. It was an amazing and unique experience. Although I did a similar English teaching camp last summer, there was something much greater impact about AID. The fact that there were 425 of us volunteers is crazy, and it was so awesome to meet the other volunteers who had their own stories. The adults we were in contact with were also extremely helpful and dependent. I am thankful for everything that we were provided with and I feel so lucky to have experienced this once in a lifetime opportunity. I will never forget the students I have come to love, and my teammates that have supported me and each other through so much, and many more memories to come. I truly hope we made an impact on the students lives and inspired them to continue learning English.
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Li, Justin (黎彥廷)
During my time here in Matsu, I've learned a lot about the people here and how they live. I would say that it's very different compared to live in the United States and I really enjoyed meeting new people and getting to know their culture better. The food here was unbelievable and every night brought new excitements and aromas. The children were really well behaved and I really enjoyed teaching them new things everyday.
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Chen, Sarina (陳怡潔)
I joined AID Summer this summer to volunteer, to teach, to make friends, and…to have an excuse to visit Taiwan and eat delicious food like mango. It was just going to be a “wonderful four weeks” of fun labor. But, that wasn’t really how it went. Sure, I did all the above, but more importantly, I earned a valuable, long-lasting friendship with my kids, my teaching group, my counselors, and my teacher’s family and a dream to see all these people again in my lifetime.
So it started like this. I hauled my small luggage filled with several pounds of Costco gummies to the steps of Chientan, where I went to sign in. This was where I met Laura, my teaching partner. We had talked over Facebook before the program started and requested each other as partners, so I was pretty excited already. Later,I met the rest of my teaching group, which included Emily, Sabrina, Hellen, and Rachel. The Chientan meals were alright. On the first dinner, all I remembered was that the cooks tried to mimic a Western style so we had chicken nuggets with some really dark, sweet ketchup. We were slightly disappointed because we came here to eat good Asian food that every tourist must have, but sometimes they had good food (I really liked the Pork Sung and died a little on the inside whenever we had to dump it because I couldn’t finish it for our table). The counselors were even surprised that we could use chopsticks. Anyways, the training weeks at Chientan were very tedious. All we would do was eat breakfast, sit and listen to lectures, eat lunch, sit and listen to lectures, eat dinner, work on our working journals, and sleep. We never really went outdoors at all (so maybe that’s why a lot of people are so pale here…). And. That’s pretty much 8 hours of sitting per day. At night, Sabrina would put on movies from her laptop for all of us to watch. We got through Tangled, Wreck It Ralph, and The Amazing Spiderman. The best part of that week was when my group got to go to the Shilin night market on Wednesday night. Lydia, my counselor, took us to eat the must-have mango shaved snow, which was absolutely amazing. When Friday came, we had to say goodbye to Lydia and rode for 6 hours on the tour bus to Zhongyun Junior High in Linyuan District of Kaohsiung County(basically, it was really really far away).
Zhongyun Middle School was so pretty. It’s literally next to the beach; we could see waves crash from the second floor (the third floor had the best view). We stayed in a large, vacant classroom in an area called Little Fisherman. It was ocean-themed, which was really cute and they even had a picture of a tree with a fish face on it. I called it a Treefish. We had to walk along an outdoor hallway to get from our room to the bathroom, but it was okay because we could feel the cool breeze and hear the water at night, which was quite soothing. The teacher’s wife and youngest daughter Doris lived with us in that classroom to make sure we were safe. Plus, they did more than enough, like did our laundry, prepared homemade snacks, mopped the floor, and cut four different kinds of fruit early in the morning. They were originally planning on buying us hamburgers for breakfast, since last year’s teachers enjoyed it. But we don’t even eat hamburgers that often back in America- and I don’t think I could stand eating that every day. Luckily, we tagged along to see the menu, but didn’t really like anything so we requested fruit and the most delicious soymilk ever.
On the first day of school, we had to perform and give a speech at the school’s opening ceremony, which some important people (like the legislator and news reporters) were attending. While we were waiting for the staff to set up the sound system, we led Simon Says. The funniest thing was that when I said, “Simon says…dance!” everyone just sat down except for a really energetic student named Oscar because he loves dancing. We prepared a hand clapping skit, a short dance to “Happy,” and our self-introductions two days earlier- so none of us felt prepared at all. Luckily, we didn’t mess up that badly on any of them. I just joked around on my self-introduction by talking about my favorite foods with my mediocre Chinese. As we were walking out to our classrooms, John asked me if he can go to the restroom in Chinese, but I said “Wo ting bu dong.” Surprisingly, he immediately switched gears and asked, “Can I go to the bathroom?” in almost perfect-sounding English. I was impressed and he set my first impression of my class A-1 at a pretty high standard. But actually, in class, everyone was dead silent. They just stared and sat still, especially Nina with her huge dark brown eyes. Even if Laura or I asked a yes or no question no one moved or made a sound. We switched to Chinese, “Ni men ting de dong ma?” and still no one moved. Eventually, after we taught greeting words like “hello” and “thank you” we asked if this was easy in English and Chinese. They slightly nodded, meaning yes. Finally- an answer. So this is a problem we didn’t expect to have, since our students were very shy (the teacher even warned us about this so many times in Chientan). To end our first day, we played Human Knots, which was pretty much impossible for them because they believed in cooties. Seriously? I took a stamp away from one of the smartest, yet most mischievous student named Jason because Laura and I started getting annoyed.
You know the term “saved by the bell?” Well, that was how my teaching partner and I felt during the first two days of school. Our kids were quiet- basically statues- all they did was listen and stare with their straight faces. I wasn’t even sure if they understood us but we made sure to stay away from the Chinese, hoping that their English was good enough (shown by their pre-tests). For every period, things in our agenda kept getting pushed up and there was a lot of stalling. We even let them go on break 10 minutes early once, making their break 20 minutes long. It was really awkward because no one really moved. They just stared around until the school bell rang indicating the actual recess. On the second day, we taught our class the “Cha-Cha Slide” because we were learning directions, which turned out to be too easy for some students. Laura taught them how to actually Cha-cha, so then we started showing them other moves like disco, sprinkler, and chicken legs, which they all still remember. The thing that broke the ice was my cow joke while they were working on some writing assignment in the afternoon. I went to one of the tables and asked them, “Why did the farmer buy a brown cow?” “Because he wanted chocolate milk.” Instantly, Jason couldn’t stop laughing and once he laughed, the whole class was bursting was laughter. Rachel then asked (in Chinese), “Is that really true?” And the class laughed even harder. It was really heart-relieving to know that I could actually make these kids happy…thus, there IS hope for day three.
The third day was when Laura and I succeeded in teaching; I don’t think there’s a better way to describe it. We taught them seasons, which they already knew, but we started throwing in other words like “breeze” and “humid.” For review we played a fun flyswatter game where we showed a picture of a tree with all four seasons on the projector screen. They came up with their own team names (Dora vs. Fashion Dora...since apparently Dora teaches them English in Taiwan). We would describe a season and they would have to close their eyes and spin three times (which was Sabrina and Emily’s idea) before hitting the right season on the tree. It was really fun and students were screaming answers at their teammates. Afterwards, the class watched Laura and me go against each other (they would describe a season and we would spin and run across the room to hit the season). They were very entertained. During lunchtime, we introduced them to several YouTube videos, like Anthill Art, Pentatonix, Piano Guys, and their favorite Sam Tsui (which they call their Shuai Ge). When class started again, we gave them a really fun writing and drawing assignment where the class is divided into four groups, one for each season. As we were walking around to proofread, pretty much all students were actively engaged. We discovered that Oscar and Mia are basically cartoonists with their amazing drawings and creativity, while other students gave them ideas of draw. For example, Ted told his classmate to draw a squirrel (in Chinese) as I was walking by and I taught them the word squirrel and even drew a cute one on the board, which I left for the rest of my teaching period. For those who have finished early or think it’s way too easy, I prepared a small reading comprehension story I composed the night before for them to figure out. It was exactly what they needed to keep them busy. What’s better was that Oscar, Abby, Linda, and Zoe worked together to figure out the definition of new words, like complain (which they taught me the Chinese translation: bao yuan). Everyone was pretty excited with their assignments, as it was fun and easy yet had a lot of potential for learning new words. This allowed us teachers to smoothly transition to our last item on the agenda, which was to introduce the parts of a tree, in order to read The Giving Tree. Everything on our working journal was falling so perfectly in place that day, and when it was time to leave, the students were smiling and saying goodbye to us.
For the rest of the week, the students were as energetic as ever, although Laura and I felt like we reached our peak on day three. Plus, we were pretty tired from getting four or five hours of sleep per day. Yet, we both get our energy from our kids, so when they do their own writing assignments or rest during nap time, we suddenly realize how tired we are. I would like to mention that not all students sleep during naptime. Luckily, since I have access to Wi Fi on campus, I like to check my Facebook. It just so happened that Jason posted a picture of John making an awkward face on the JJHS Facebook group page. I left a picture comment of me trying to imitate John’s expression, which made Jason burst out laughing for the last five minutes of naptime. When we turned the lights back on, I put the two pictures side by side on the smart board. I felt like the first week was a time to really get to know our students as they open up to us. During break, I would let Linda play my Candy Crush and reward her if she ever beat the level I’ve been stuck on for the past few months (level 415. She didn’t beat it…). We would also play Puppet Soccer against John, show Abby more cover songs, and copy Oscar’s funny noises (one which became a team name and class inside joke). We also pushed away a lot of first impressions about our students. Nina, the super quiet one who stares, was actually really smart and helped Rachel even though they worked slow and never asked questions. Ted and Jason H. went up to the smart board to study the geography map during break, since we had just learned countries and were going to play the flyswatter game. Peggy, Vicky, Mia, and Maggie do work hard in their individual classwork even though they seem to always act as one unit.
When the weekend came along, the teacher rented a van and took us to Kenting, where we hiked in the national park and saw the most southern tip of Taiwan. We also went to a spa, where there was a pool with a lot of little fishies that would nibble on our feet to eat away our dead skin. We were so excited about the cute fish but they tickled so much that I became scared. They also really liked Rachel’s feet for some reason. Oh, and Emily taught me how to swim so I won’t drown if that time will ever come! On the long car ride back home, I started reading so many signs along the road that had the word mango, that the teacher seemd to pick it up and stop at a shop along the road and bought us mango shaved ice topped with ice cream. I really didn’t mean for that to happen…but it was delicious, and I learned my lesson of not ever mentioning anything edible in the car of a generous family. On Sunday, we went to Fo Guan Shan and this one Hakka place where we ate Ban Tiao and made our own lei cha (their gui hua cha was also amazingly good that I wish I could have it every weekend). After that, we went to a place where we bought popsicles: red bean, green bean, taro, peanut, and this one wheat one (I forgot the name). All we did was eat that day, which sounded like every other day here in Linyuan. Nevertheless, that was a weekend to remember.
When second week came by the school already had some special events planned for us, like a tour to CPC, a helicopter landing in the track field, and a Space talk from a professor (which got cancelled due to the typhoon). We bonded more closely to our students, but there weren’t too many noteworthy things. At the moment, I could think of finally hearing Tina’s LOUD voice (although in Chinese) when she screamed Laura’s name when we were passing out cute pencil cases that were gifts from CPC. I also showed John and the Jasons Cat Mario and showed Linda a very scary online comic (upon her request for a scary movie) during breaks. On Wednesday, class was cancelled due to the Typhoon Matmo, which made many of us sad. The girls (except me) were excited that they could sleep in and wanted breakfast at 9 am, but I whined that I wanted to wake up earlier and have breakfast at 7, otherwise I would walk to the teacher’s house at eat Eric’s pet bunny Momo. The teacher’s wife, which I call Mommy, said that we could walk to Seven-Eleven around 6am to buy food. However, I woke up at 4 by the sound of heavy rain and Mommy checked the weather outside and just went back to sleep, since there was nothing to do. At around 6am, I couldn’t help but get up to use the restroom, since Wi fi disappeared and I was bored to death. I opened the door and rain was basically flying horizontally. I ran across the hallway to open the bathroom door, and ran all the way back to the classroom. I was drenched and seemed to have woken up the others who were worried about me. Mommy told us girls that we shouldn’t go out in the rain so we have to pee in a bucket and dump it outside, but obviously and funnily, everyone just decided to not go after hearing that idea. Luckily, a kind man who went to check on us went to buy us ponchos. Basically, all we did on the day of my first-ever typhoon was eat and eat and eat some more. We also watched Corpse’s Bride and Ender’s Game on Sabrina’s laptop, which we connected to a projector. To our surprise, our room also had a karaoke machine where we didn’t recognize any Asian song and just sang “You are my Sunshine.” Mommy’s voice, on the other hand, was gorgeous.
When Friday, our last day came, I don’t think it has hit us teachers that day (maybe except Rachel). Laura and I spent our sleep time folding origami pandas and starburst hearts for our students with a sincere message inside as gifts. We had a water balloon fight as promised, since all of our kids practiced their closing performance Cup Song, which we basically learned the day before. I was soaked, while Emily, Rachel, Sabrina, and Eric were hit quite a few times with water. During our closing performance practice, we finally took a legit class selfie (We taught them that word). On the closing ceremony, we watched our class, class A-2, and class A-3 perform, and the class representatives (Ours being Linda) read their speeches in English. It was so cute, and many students cried because it was our last day. They showered us with way too many gifts, like a giant stuffed animal, real pineapple cake, milk tea, candy, a card, photo album, and just way too many things. When the sixth period bell rang, they all stayed behind to take pictures with us and just talk to us a little more. They (including class A-2 and A-3) even joked, “See you next week, teacher.” It was so cute.
On Saturday when we had packed our bags, the host family was basically attacking us with so many snacks for us to take with us for our tour week. We had to run away with our luggage. Poor Hellen, who got the most to carry.When we reached the meeting place in Kaohsiung, I think it has finally hit me. I started crying because I wouldn’t see this amazing family I now call my own for a while. On a happier note, we were reunited with Lydia, but it was sad that she wasn’t our counselor for the tour trip. Bus 5 got lucky. Meanwhile, I was happy with bus 6, since my new counselors were Maya, Sophia, Eejohn, and Hui Yee (who didn’t have an English name so we called her Sua ya- which means mango in Taiwanese). Together, their initials sort of spelled “M&Ms.” It took a while getting used to meeting the new people, since we were still so closely attached to our group for the past three weeks, but luckily I met new friends, like Tiffany, Denise, and Arnold! To summarize tour week really quickly, there’s a lot of sitting in the tour bus (déjà vu to Chientan) and I ended up paying a visit to the hospital, and I hope I will be fine…It IS so much fun, since I’m exploring many diverse parts of the entire Taiwan! I’m writing this in the middle of tour week, and so my trip hasn’t exactly ended. I just want to say how AID Summer is a wonderful experience to have because I have made the most wonderful memories here and learned what it really means to love my Taiwanese brothers and sisters.
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Hsieh, Grace (謝柏音)
“AID for one month??” Away from the comforts of home. Freedom restrictions in the form of time and yes, dreaded long pants. Sleepless nights (into days) from brainstorming lesson plans, making powerpoint presentation after presentation, inventing hopefully creative and innovative games. Extraterrestrial bugs that left us screaming and crying in terror on the first night of our much unanticipated arrival. A zoo of kids; we were strangers to them as they to us.
Was it worth it?
Dong Guang Guo Xiao. How unexpectedly so much joy and sadness would later resonate within me at the sound of those four words. I dropped my bags with one hand, picked up a full load of doubts with the other, questioning how well exactly the next two weeks would play out.
First off, a series of meetings. Saying hello to the kindergarten room, our new home. To Shane and James, the two ah bing ges that would be soon rechristened as Mom and Dad. Then, so soon after getting “All in This Together”, to our class of 16 fourth-sixth graders as we spent the first day teaching “Lesson Number One”. Perhaps “teaching” would be an overly generous way of describing how utterly unprepared me and my teaching partner were in the face of seemingly fluent and unparticipative English speakers. All lesson plans we originally prepared the training week at Jiantan Activity Center were trashed the night of for being too elementary, too boring, not interactive enough or nearly as challenging as our students’ levels demanded. “WHAT TO DO?!?” It was the first challenge in the series of many following, as with every day spent we got to know our students more, their personalities, quirks, rambunctiousness, playfulness, and admitting, their adorableness. It was they who challenged me, every day after Day 1 to give my 200% effort into making lectures on clothing, sports, landmarks, anything as entertaining as flyswatter game, run-to-the-corner, packing game, if only to see their excitement, energy, and enthusiasm for a language that ultimately, bridged us to them. It was they who pushed me, as well as the rest of our team of student teachers to plan big events like Dong Guang Olympics, fashion show, field trips to Miao Ko and Keelung Harbor to let our children explore, have hands-on activities and competitions to make their, and therefore mine, experience with AID so much more awesome.
Maybe it was the way Richard would pretend to shoot rubber bands at me, laughing hysterically at me feebly dodging behind any building structure available in the vicinity. Or how he would consistently, repeatedly bang his head into me until I reached out a hand to ruffle his hair, telling him that indeed, his head was as heavy as bowling ball. Or maybe it was the way Nana always tugged on the corners of my shirt, saying, “Eat lunch with me today!!”or “Sit next to me, Grace teacher!!”. Or when Gavin, after pulling him aside for fighting with the other kids, would try his best to control his anger and listen to me, to be good. Then give me one of his incredibly sweaty, yet sweet hugs. Or when Emmy gave me a handmade, multicolor loop bracelet. Or afterschool when I held Justin’s water bottle hostage to try to get him to play with us teachers instead of waiting alone for his mom. Or maybe that time Justin, after getting into so many fights with Gavin, bought him a drink when he had no money, just to make up. Perhaps it was being called “TAI ZUO!” by the with-more-swag-than-he-needs cute brat in the camp, Alan. Or maybe just seeing those 16 eager faces looking up at me expectantly, every morning.
It was going out every other night with James and Shane to do laundry and making our religious trips to 7-11 for the next morning’s breakfast: always, always, fan tuan. Playing truth or dare which resulted in confessions about girlfriends, face rubbing, and somehow, me eating an ant. Changing out of sweat-drenched jeans into comfortable shorts and flip flops to the daily after school meetings to work on our working journals, exchange the funny stories of the day about our kids, chill around drinking ai yu tea one day, eating ba wan the next. Eating dinner together as a family, be it Pizza Hut on the floor of the kindergarden room or Ze Chao at a nicer restaurant. Taking the most ridiculous selfies. Watching Tarzan and eating bowl after bowl of ramen during the one typhoon vacation day. Crazy shopping in Keelung and Rao He night market, for delicious snacks and of course, good deals on countless stands of cute clothes!! Being so blessed to have celebrated my 19th birthday at Ching Jing Long Chang with some of the sweetest people I know.
I didn’t want it to end. But as with all good things, it did eventually. 2 weeks passing by in a blur of thankfulness, craziness, and joy because with all this time, AID Summer Camp of 2014 finally made me discover this passion—how much I have always loved to teach English. Especially to these Taiwanese kids I call my own.
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Thio, Marianne (張藩予)
Aid summer was one of the best things I did during the summer. It was a fun program where you not only helped disadvantaged children but also got to meet new people and have fun. Although the beginning of the program, where you had to go to lecture after lecture, was a little boring, you got to learn new techniques to get your class to learn and pay attention. The school that I went to was also very nice to us. Although we stayed at the school instead of a host family, it was still a fun experience. We stayed at the school library with our teacher, who was always with us, even on her birthday. The experience of staying at the school allowed us to get to know each other more and also allowed us to explore our school more. The staff and teachers were very nice and constantly spoiled us with so many drinks that we could no longer fit them into the fridge. The children were also very cute and nice. The class that I taught were 6th graders, and was also the troublemakers. Although they were troublesome, the children were very kind to us and caused us no troubles. One of the kids always helped us out on wiping the blackboard during break, and would always lend their stuff to the other kids. I was also able to get close to other children in different classes because they would come visit our classroom. Our class was very fun. They were always motivated by the prizes we had. Our class really like balloons, rather than candy which was really funny. We were also running our class by a reward system, and the ones with the most stickers at the end of the day would get to buy anything they wanted from 7-11 as long as it was under 50元. That's why when we offered 5 stickers for them to do something, they would all immediately rise their hands. One of the activities we did at our school was writing letters, and sending them. Some of our kids sent it to us, and two of our boys decided to write love letters for the girls in the class next door. Although we did not get to read the letters, we got to learn of what they wrote when the other teacher, in the class next door read it out loud for them. Another thing that I like about my class was that when we played the spelling game, where you wrote on the back of someone's back. Since it was a relay, they were always very competitive, and when someone started to talk about the letter, one team would complain. Another thing they did was when they did not know what the person was writing, they would say, "這是什麼鬼字！?!?!?" There was also a time when they were practicing for the closing ceremony performance and they were singing the wrong lyrics, the lyrics was "tell me that you MISS me," and one of the kids sang, "tell me that you KISS me." Having this one word difference made the song more funny than it was suppose to; However, it was memories like these that made the closing ceremony so sad. I was one of the first to start crying, which was really embarrassing, because I started crying during the first performance, and one of the smaller classes was watching me cry instead of watching the performance. Although it was sad leaving the school, the tour was really fun. My bus mates were a lot of fun and I also got to meet new people on other buses. The only thing I did not like about the tour was the strict clothing restriction. Besides that the places and things you did we're really fun. This is all I can think about for now, so that's it! Bye, bye and thank you AID!
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Chiu, Kimberly (邱瀚儀)
During these two weeks, our group went to four different villages. Apparently, we were going to five different villages, but the typhoon hit the last village, so we went back to Hualien two days early. It was such a great and special experience. We met different aboriginal people and learned different cultures because we moved every two to three days. Our teaching schedule was really different too; we started our first class on Sunday because they have Sunday service in the morning, and then we began our opening ceremony in the afternoon. The students’ English levels were really different too.
In the first village, the church added more classes to enable the kids to learn more English, but they didn’t tell us whom we were going to teach, so we were really nervous. We knew that there were going to be a lot of old people coming five minutes before the class start, so we tried to split into three class, with one class for the kindergarten to elementary school kids, one class for the teenagers, and another class for the old people. All of the girls teach the kindergarten to elementary school kids, some of them were not paying any attention at all since we were at a place that have no chairs for them to sit in and there were a lot of things for the children to play with it.
In the second village, we split all the kids into two groups because there were less people. The little kids were mostly kindergarteners or not even in kindergarten yet, but there were a few elementary school students too. These kids were even harder to control than the first village, there were basically only three people who were listening to us and answering questions. The second day was better, but when they knew that we were going to play with water for the outdoor activity, they started to not cooperating in class or just flat out not listening to us at all.
In the third village, we just taught them for a morning. They were singing and dancing very enthusiastically compares to all the churches (villages), and they learned really fast. During break times, the children like to climb on to us, and made us play with them, but during class time, they were very corporative.
In the forth village, the class time was met with both the typhoon and the village’s festival. The classes started really late, we even thought that no one was going to come. The kids were pulled out from their festival, so they did not really want to learn, and they were afraid to speak English.
I think this was a really special experience since all the people stayed at their school for two weeks, but our group moved from place to place. This gave us a different perspective compares to other groups, even though the students probably did not learn as much as they would if our group taught them for the two full weeks that other groups have at their disposal.
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Chien, Naomi Wei-Chia (簡瑋佳)
2014 AID Summer Post-Reflection
Initially, the AID Summer Overseas Youth English Teaching Program was just a puzzle with all the right pieces; it was a service project in Taiwan with free lodging and food! What could be better, right? But as the check-in date of the program approached, I began to doubt the validity of my decision. Questions started bursting into my mind—one after another—what if I don’t make any friends? What are my roommates like? How convenient will my assigned school be? Will I be trapped in “the middle of nowhere” for two weeks? Well, let me just say, all of my expectations were false! AID Summer is so much more than that; it isn't merely a program for 425 volunteers to teach English, but a source of knowledge for Taiwanese decedents… to learn about friendship, hardship, teamwork, and most importantly, our cultural background!
To me, July 6th, is still a vivid memory—from the greetings of the gray shirt counselors to the meeting of the other volunteers! I remember standing outside my room at the Chientan Youth Activity Center and thinking, “Why am I locked out of my room in this heat?!” But thinking back today, I’m glad I was steamed a little with that horrendous humidity because it was during that time that I met my adorable teaching partner, Tiffany Huang! As the day went on, I came to meet the four other members of A1-8: the piano prodigy Roger Cheng, the shy athlete Yi Tuan, the selfie-master Wendy Hsei, and the fashionable cutie Emily Chu! At first, I wondered if we would all get along and work as an unstoppable team! Little did I know that throughout the two weeks of teaching in Meinong, Kaohsiung, we would become the A1-8 family along with our irreplaceable mentor teachers, Jocelyn Kuo and Jason Chu!
Although the training week was a little challenging to keep up with—lecture after lecture, planning after planning—it was definitely an informative week of new ideas for my teaching plan. However, as far as hard work goes, there were also some stolen moments of sweet memories; it ranges from the visit to the Shilin night market to a visit of the doctor when you’re sick to a simple visit of the laundry room at 4am with your teaching partner!:) By the end of the first week, I knew that AID Summer would be a life-changing experience!
To be honest, as my group stepped out of the Chientan Youth Activity complex on Friday morning, we were all awed by the sudden surge of direct sunlight on our skin! In addition, we were one of the few extremely lucky groups to be taking the Taiwan High Speed Rail to our assigned city of Kaohsiung—arriving at the city in less than two hours when a normal bus ride would have taken more than five hours! Once we arrived, we were picked up to go to the district of Meinong, where we lived and taught for the following two weeks! As we arrived at Hu Mei Yin (Home Inn), I was struck by the beauty of the surrounding nature; the glorious mountains and fields of greenery shimmered under the sunlight of the small but culturally compact district of Meinong! So it was there in the midst of the beautiful scenery—which was also a convenient location—that we resided for two weeks.
Unlike the other groups of AID Summer, A1-8 was assigned to teach at two different elementary schools within the two weeks—one week at Zhongtan Elementary and the other at Guangsing Elementary—which meant we began the opening ceremony of teaching immediately on Saturday. For our performance, we did the all too familiar “We’re all in this together,” which expressed the feeling we wanted to give to our students—no one is alone on this journey of learning English! While the kids at Zhongtan were lacking knowledge in simple English, they were full of energy and excitement to grasp what they could during the week! On the other hand, students at Guangsing had a little higher level of English but lacked the enthusiasm to learn! However, as Tiffany and I delve deep to try and understand each and every student, we found out that that every single one of them has a unique characteristic; whether it’s to be kind hearted, helpful, funny, or shy!
After teaching for two weeks, I realized children really do need the attention of patient teachers! Some may need a boost in confidence, some may need a little extra help on lessons, or some may need encouragement to follow their dreams; but whatever it is they may need, as long as you are there willing to help, they will open up and look up to you no matter what.
In the end, the chance to teach two different schools was best thing I could have gotten (even though we had to teach for 14 days with no weekends off) because more schools= more kids, more kids= more fun & love, and more fun & love= more memories! AID Summer definitely made this summer unforgettable, and if I could, I would do it again in a heartbeat!
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Leu, Cynthia (呂欣雅)
I remember the first week of AID going by super slowly. Making a teaching plan and writing working journals took a lot of thought process, creativity, and time. By the end of the week of nonstop lectures, I wasn't so sure if I was ready for the teaching to start.
I knew Bi Tan Primary School was going to be in the countryside, but I was still surprised. I mean, it's not an everyday experience showering in a school restroom without a direct ceiling over the showers and with geckos and moths every night. Having eight girls living and working with each other 24/7 wasn't exactly easy either. Girls can easily get very catty and moody. Thank goodness though, as long as we communicated with each other, everything worked out in the end. After four weeks with my group members, I think I can say that I love and I'll miss all seven of them.
The best experience, though, was the teaching. The first day was especially hard. You never know what to expect, and I wasn't very sure either if I was going to have enough teaching materials. It didn't exactly get easier as the days went by. Every day was a routine of waking up at 7, teaching from 9 to 12, eating lunch and testing for one hour, and teaching again from 1 to 4. After that, we did laundry, ate dinner, showered, and just prepared the teaching materials for the next day. The only breather we had each night was our little break for eating ramen. The kids were really rowdy some days. There was this one boy, I remember, who'd always talk back when my partner, Allison, and I told him to stop fooling around. He never learned, even on the last day of school. I was so exhausted after each day. But, I really wouldn't my experiences for anything. My students were the cutest, sweetest kids ever. I can confidently say that I loved my kids more than any of the other teachers did. I can also confidently say that I had the best students at that school. I love every single one of them, even that one troublemaker. Even though they all caused trouble in the classroom, during break times and after school - sometimes even in the classroom - they often expressed their love and adoration for Alli and me. "老師，我愛你" "老師，這送給你" They tried really hard in class as well. As much as they talk and argue in class, they still worked hard in learning the vocabulary and sentences we taught them. Many of them would even write the 注音符號 pronunciation of the words to better learn how to say them.
You know how kids always complain about how boring class is and how lame the games and activities are? My kids did that all the time. Except, I never believed that, at least not after a few days later. They act bored, but they always still took notes in class and participated enthusiastically in the games. Maybe it's because we rewarded them points for taking notes, or because we were technically still the rule-making teachers in the classroom, but it still made me proud as their teacher. It also made me proud when we had group activities with all four classes and my kids could answer questions thrown by the other teachers.
Even more than the classroom teaching, I enjoyed playing and talking with the kids during lunch and before and after school. Some of them were more mature, some of them were more playful, all of them were beautiful inside and out. Many of them had dysfunctional family problems, so school was a sanctuary to them. It really warmed my heart whenever they were willing to talk to me. It made me feel like I was actually doing something right with my life.
The last two days of the two weeks, Friday and Saturday, tore my heart apart. Besides my own kids, I met so many other beautiful children from the other three classes. Instead of only missing thirteen kids, I would miss all 51 students from the school. Except, I couldn't cry no matter what during the closing ceremony on Friday. Many of my members cried, yet not a single tear came out of me. Michael, one of the students in my class, cried really hard. It actually surprised me, because I didn't expect any of the kids to miss us. I never thought I made a big enough impact with my students. I don't think I'll ever understand why they treated so well, with so much love. Nonetheless, I'm extremely grateful for everything the students and staff had done for us. Saturday was the most heartbreaking for me. I woke up at 7 and went down at 7:30 to talk to the kids who came for weekly English classes offered by the school. A lot of them asked me to sign their notebooks and gave me presents. Even then it didn't fully hit me that the two weeks was coming to an end. As the time slowly reached 9, which was when the bus was going to come pick us up, I started treating every minute preciously, taking countless pictures with everyone there. When the bus finally came and we had to hug all our kids goodbye, I finally broke down. I literally bawled to the point that I couldn't see because my glasses were so dirtied. Michael was crying really hard as well.
The past month gave me so many new memories and experiences I know I won't be able to find anywhere. This was the most worthwhile thing I've ever done my entire life. I may have complained all too often this month, but in the end, I really loved every second of it. I love all of my students, my group members, the two soldiers stationed at the school who kept us company every day and night, all of my counselors. If I had the chance, I would do this all over again. AID is truly the most meaningful thing I've ever done.
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Nan, Emily (南于祥)
AID Summer 2014 Reflection
I joined the AID program mostly because my mom recommended it to me. When I heard that I would be teaching English, I was originally against it. I didn’t think I would be good at it and I also did not think I would get chosen. However, after I applied, I began to start getting excited. I would be able to meet cool people, help students become more successful, be able to tour Taiwan, and have something to put on my resume. Anyway, I was too busy with college to think much about the application. However, when I found out I got in and the start date was approaching, I started getting more nervous. What if the kids are hard to teach? What if my teaching partners were mean?
Once I got here, however, I realized that all my fears were unfounded. It was difficult, but not overly so. My teaching group turned out to be the best group of girls. Even though we all had different tastes and habits, we worked extremely well together. At Chientan on the first week, we all gave each other ideas and tips on how to teach. My teaching partner and I were very different, but we worked extremely well together. During the teaching week, we taught together, our teaching styles complemented each other. I never thought I would be a very capable teacher, but my experience proved me wrong. The most important thing was to let the kids have fun, and we succeeded in that part very well. Mixing in English learning with fun games was the best part. Everyone seemed to love it.
The class I taught was also extraordinarily well-behaved. At first, they were very shy, never daring to speak above a whisper when I asked them a question. Gradually, however, they warmed up to us, until they treated us more as older sisters than as teachers. The turning point came during the first Wednesday, when we played the flyswatter game with the day’s new vocab. The game was interrupted in the middle by a break, and one of the students came up with the idea for Sabrina and me to play against each other, using the same vocab words, but they would say it in Chinese so we could learn too. Pretty soon, many other students joined in, making us spin in a circle while they called out the Chinese translations of our vocab words. After that, some students came up to talk to us during break about America, even asking us to attend one of their dance performances over the weekend. Another student also taught me how to play a form of Chinese chess, even making me a helpful diagram that ranks the order of the pieces.
Someone once told me that the best thing a teacher can strive for is to walk into their classroom and see that a student has drawn a picture of them on the board. It happened to us on the last day, and I am immensely grateful. I had so much fun teaching and hanging out with new friends during those 2 teaching weeks that leaving was so hard.
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