Author: Yu Guomei, teacher of Nongxing preschool in Longling County

"Here's the teacher, here's the teacher!" They rushed towards us. Just after entering the village, we saw that the children were waiting for us.

Since the preschool has not yet started, the project staff went instead together to visit the children's homes. The day before the visit I had told the parents in the Weixin group that I didn't expect the children to come to the village entrance the next day to receive me.

The village is large, and the road to each child's home is winding. It turns from left to right. We finally arrived to the decided destination at noon, after several wrong turns.

”Teacher come to my house first!”. "No, let's go to my house first. It’s near...". The children grabbed my hands and told me to go to their home first.

I smiled and told them which family I would go to first, and then to the other families one after the other.

When we came to the children's homes, their parents and grandparents were all there. Before we entered the gate, they already were stepped out of their homes to welcome us. They had stopped working in the fields when they learned that we were going to visit them. Tea and water, fruit, melon seeds and sugar was all prepared and stuffed into our hands. The parents were really enthusiastic.

After the exchange of greetings, we asked the children about their recent stay at home. Parents all said “we don’t dare to take ourchildren out during this holiday due of the epidemic. Fortunately, there is a teacher behind us to help guide the weekly theme activities. Our children are very sensible. They can wash their own clothes, shoes and help with some housework. But there is not much work in the field, so we want to let our children stay at home and read more books. No need for them to follow in our footsteps! We have expectations to our children’s future. But what a trouble it must be for the teacher to have the children in the preschool”.

The parents’ simple words come straight from their hearts. Every parent in the countryside expects their children to reach a more promising future than what they themselves accomplished in life, and to cross the mountain outside the village to go their own way.

Usually, I can meet parents face-to-face in the preschoolor by phone, but now when sitting together with them I can really understood their expectations and deep feelings of love for their children.

I immediately felt that all my work was worthwhile and meaningful.

Letting the children come together and teaching them how to make "caterpillars" themselves. We use different colors of plasticine (a soft modeling material) to make a circle and stick them together to make the body of the caterpillar. We also make the head, eyes and legs of the caterpillar. At last, the table is full of the colorful caterpillars we made.

In addition to craft handwork, we also let the children paint, dance and playing games together, when we visit their homes. We taught them to wash their hands properly, so that they wouldn’t get the virus. Parents sat by and watched us doing it. Some of them also participated. From time to time, everyone laughed.

Not only are the children having a good time, but also the parents are very happy to see that we are treating the children with our heart.

When we were about to leave for the next child's home, the parents offered to show us the way, since we were not familiar with the village.

As time passes, in the sky the sun passes the whole village. Almost in a flash it falls on the top of the mountain and sprinkles the whole village with its last afterglow. All of a sudden, everything turns into golden yellow: golden roofs, golden brick walls, golden people.

Our short visit is coming to an end. When they got to know that we are going to leave, the smiles on the children's faces were gone.

"Teacher, can you stay a little longer?"

"Teacher, don't go back. You can stay at my house tonight."

"Teacher, when will you come back to my house?"

"Teacher, when does our preschool begin?"

"Teacher, have the flowers I planted in the preschool grown up?"

"Teacher, I miss the preschool."

.......

 The children all came around and grabbed my clothes and asked like this.

The children were reluctant to let us go, they have been thinking about the preschool, they have long been looking forward to come back to school.

My dearest children, your teachers also miss you very much.

When it got so late, that we had no other choice than to leave, the parents showed us the shortest direction, saying thanks to us all the way, and the children led us out of the village.

Quite a while after leaving the village I turned around and found that the children were still standing there, waving to us.
See you! Children, I'm waiting for you in the preschool.

Project introduction:

The project of Nongxing preschool in Longling County, Yunnan Province is funded by Shenzhen Yixing Business Travel Co., Ltd. and implemented by “The Federation For Associations Connected to The International Humana People To People Movement (Switzerland) Yunnan Representative Office” and the Poverty Alleviation and Development Office of Longling County People's government. The specific content of the project includes improvement of hardware, providing a preschool classroom, lunch break room, outdoor space and other infrastructure maintenance, toys and teaching aids; providing training for preschool teachers; supervising and managing the daily operation of the preschool; assisting teachers to provide parent training for Preschool Parents; establishing a parent committee to participate in the management of the preschool. Curriculum focuses on children's comprehensive development in five fields: Health, language, society, science and art. Through the provision of high-quality pre-school education services the children are fully prepared to enter primary school.

The project is supported by Shenzhen Yixing Business Travel Co., Ltd.

This article only represents the author's point of view, not the donor's point of view or position.