中文
HOME
HOME / LATEST NEWS / Content

8th Grade Next Door Buddy Service Learning Team

January 16, 2018

8th Grade Next Door Buddy Service Learning Team

Founded in September 2017 by Emma and Hannah from 8(2), ‘Next-door Buddy’ offers fun English classes for small kids within a neighborhood. The next-door kids benefit from it by learning in a familiar and cordial environment with next door ‘young teachers’. The next-door parents benefit by saving time and energy from transporting kids across the city for classes. The ‘young teachers’, by helping people around them & within their neighborhood, have helped to build a stronger and closer community. Nowadays, people spend so much time online, it is common that people do not know their next-door neighbors. The ‘Next-door Buddy’ group creates more opportunities for neighboring parents and kids to meet face-to-face and to learn together.

Through weekly sessions, the “Next-door Buddy” has provided nine classes in the Fall semester for a group of 3-4 year olds living in Xiangmei Garden. The lessons initially focused on teaching the letters of the alphabet and simple words, and then gradually, spent more time reading picture books and singing nursery rhymes. By the end of the 9th class, the little kids were not only familiar with the alphabet and simple words, but were also able to sing 5 nursery rhymes. ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’ was their favorite!

With little experience of teaching and caring for young children, Hannah and Emma’s first lesson turned out to be difficult to manage. Gradually, however, they gained skills and patience in dealing with active and naughty kids. They used more games to make the learning interactive and fun to prevent the kids from becoming bored and distracted. They also gave out stickers as incentives and rewards to keep the kids quiet and the classes more organized. They learned how hard it is to be a teacher, keeping children interested while teaching useful knowledge at the same time. Despite these troubles, it is rewarding to see the parents, and especially the kids, beginning to treat them as trustable friends.

They are happy to serve their community in such a way while learning and growing in the meantime.

(Written by Emma Li 8(2) Directed by Ms. Gu Pictures by Emma Li 8(2) )