work in china

It's Thurs. already. The work week is going very fast. I have been talking about the similarities at work. Children are the same everywhere. I have children from France, Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, US, Singapore, China, South Africa but when they are playing it is no different than all the children I have ever worked with in Canada or the little bit of play I have seen in Italy. The majority of these children speak English and/or Chinese. Only 1 boy only speaks French but he stills play along with the others. There are teachers from Scotland, Indonesia, Australia and Canada that I know of that are familiar with Jolly Phonics.
Differences: The ratios: although we are using a ration of 1 - 10 for 3 & 4 yr olds the foundation actually has a policy of 1 - 11 for 3's and 1 - 12 for 4's. It doesn't matter how much space you have officially but here at Season's Villas (the name of the campus I am working on) because we have less space we don't maximize the ratios. Academics have always been the driving force but fortunately for me that has changed this year. An ECE philosophy has come into play. But it is very difficult for other teachers most of whom have a teaching degree and no ECE background and don't know what to do. There is also a big concern about complaints that will come from parents that we are not "teaching" anything. I have no such concerns or complaints so far. However, I am doing daily documentation about what we learn from our play and what play is happening each day. My parents concerns are how their child is fitting in, are they getting along especially from the ones whose children cry in the morning.
Most of the mothers are at home all day. They are sending their children to school not day care. Day Care or child care or early learning care are just not terms that are used at all. The children are in school from 8 a.m. until 3:20 p.m. Something I'm not use to everyone coming and leaving at the same time. It is very confusing for about 10 minutes because of course some children start to cry when they see their mothers, everyone crowds into a small space, kids want to talk to their moms, moms want to talk to the teachers and I want people to look around the room and see the work and documentation.

Oh yes, one other difference each playroom (and their are 8 on this campus) has an ayi (pronounced ie). This wonderful woman does all the cleaning - paint brushes, containers, playdough mess, laundry, sweep, wash floors, clean bathrooms. Toys don't seem to get disinfected although they do use dettol as they clean. Toys might get disinfected in the 1 & 2 yr old rooms. However ayi who only speaks Chinese is not happy with everything being played with in the afternoon and I am insisting that yes we will paint and we will use playdough in the afternoon.