Visiting Scholar Wang Yinghong reflects on her first week in Vermont

On the eve of the new Chinese Lunar Year, Wang Yinghong’s plane was descending at the Burlington Airport. While Wang Yonghing has never traveled to Vermont before, the placement at Randolph Union High School is almost a homecoming since Yonghing had the opportunity to work with staff from the school. In 2009, Dean Meltzer, 8^th grade science teacher, and his wife Dona from Braintree School, went on sabbatical for a year in the Lijiang Province. Wang Yonghing met the Metltzers during their sabbatical and even had the chance to meet with their daughter.  

Wang Yonghing shared these thoughts of her first few weeks in Vermont:

“I'm getting used to being here. I can sleep well at night. Dean and Dona, my host family, cook different foods every day. They try to let me find the foods I like most.

       Everyone in the school are all very nice. I observed different classes last week. I had the most interesting math class here. I enjoyed the Spanish class even I can't understand a word in there. I learned a lot from the science class. I found a new way to teach English. I'm very surprised that the English teacher and the man who teach geography prepared a class together. Students can learn a lot about Africa when they learn from an African novel. I observed the students practice drama, and I joined the students in the gym.

     I will have class soon. I will share Mandarin and Chinese culture in my class. I also want to show them Ljiang (culture & scenic spots). I will teach Naxi dance with the physical teacher. I will do Dongba pictographic characters with the art teacher. I also will go to some elementary school to do some workshop.”

Asian Studies Outreach Program Welcomes Wang Yinghong

Superintendent Brent Kay, Wang Yinghong, and Dean Meltzer 

This week the Asian Studies Outreach Program and Randolph Union High School welcomed Visiting Scholar Wang Yinghong, from Lijiang, China. The young Visiting Scholar, who is a social studies teacher at the Vocational High School of Gucheng District, Lijiang, China, is the 9^th Visiting Scholar to participate in the State-wide Program for Asian Studies in Schools for the 2011-2012 academic year.

While Wang Yonghing has never traveled to Vermont before, the placement at Randolph Union High School is almost a homecoming since Yonghing had the opportunity to work with staff from the school. In 2009, Dean Meltzer, 8^th grade science teacher, and his wife Dona from Braintree School, went on sabbatical for a year in the Lijiang Province. Wang Yonghing met the Metltzers during their sabbatical and even had the chance to meet with their daughter.  

Wang Yinghong will be returning to China in June, but prior to that hopes to learn about Vermont and share her culture at the school.

The Art of Double Happiness

There are many traditions involved with celebrating the Lunar Chinese New Year. During her stay at CVU this past month, Visiting Scholar TaoYe from China shared with the high school students the practice of making paper cutting decorations for the New Year.  While paper-cutting may sound like an easy task, the activity involves an understanding of Chinese calligraphy, patience, and a fair bit of skill. Visiting Scholar comments on the activity below:

“The CVU students are amazing, after they learned how to  build up Chinese characters with different strokes, they drew these difficult Chinese symbols, and then cut them down, glue them on a piece of colorful paper, they took these paper- cutting home and decorated room for Chinese New Year.”

The Chinese characters the students learned how to write included “Spring”, “Double Happiness”, and “Good luck”, all important words to know if one wants to celebrate the Chinese New Year well!

Check out the pictures below to see Visiting Scholar Tao Ye and the students sharing a great cultural tradition!

Shaftsbury Elementary Students Celebrate a Thai Mother’s Day

In each country and every culture, the tradition of “Mother’s Day” is celebrated across the globe with different traditions. The students at Shaftsbury Elementary school had the chance to learn about how families in Thailand celebrate Mother’s Day with the help of Visiting Scholar Parisa.

“Mother's Day in Thailand is on August 12^th, and it is also Her Majesty Queen Sirikit's birthday.” Explain Parisa. Since 1976, celebrations for the Queen’s birthday and for mothers are celebrated on the same say as the Queen is regarded as mother to all Thai people because of her benevolence towards the needy and poor in the nation.

In Thailand, Parisa explained, preparations for the Queen’s birthday start a few weeks before August 12^th, with people all around the country raising national flags and decorating their houses with the portrait of Her Majesty the Queen.  On August 12^th, Thai people also thank their mothers for her unconditional love by giving alms to monks and presenting their mother’s with white Jasmine flowers. In Thailand, white jasmine flowers are the symbol of maternal love. 

During the lesson, students made their own Thai Mother’s Day cards and attached a piece of white jasmine on the card. As in Thailand, the mothers’ of the Shaftbury students were encouraged to respond to the cards with a small comment. As Mother’s Day falls in the month of May in America, the mother’s of the students were surprised by the showing of love, and the beautiful flowers.