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Primary School and other works

I did some kinds of the volunteer works this term. This time was a little different. Most of the works were teaching English. There also had a work which was servicing the parents in the parents and teachers meeting. This was because of the Marketing team. I had already experienced twice before so I knew how to do that well. This could give me more experiences and improve my community skills.

One of the volunteer works was the class activity. On April 1st, we went to Beijing East Road Primary school to teach English. That was an afternoon. The students were grade 5 and very excited to let us teach them. On the way to the primary school, I was thinking about how to make those students keep quiet and study carefully because most of the pupils were quite naughty and talkative in my mind, but I was wrong. The one I taught was a very nice girl. She was polite and concentrated. She paid attention to every word I said. Her desk mate was good too. They seemed to have a competition on spelling the countries names I had gave them. I was surprised that those students were so hard-working. Many other students were not as good as this girl. The boys sat in front of the girl always wanted to play card game. They did not want study at all and asked others to play card with them. This girl was learning quietly when others yelled to play the cards. She spelled again and again on the words she could not remember. She was practicing. I told her to remember the all the words from easy to hard in the following days. She was glad to do that. She also took out her English book and read the articles. She asked me to correct the mistakes she made. I thought she must be a good leader in her class.

If every one in her class is like her, this class will be the best class. This was really a great experience and I gained a lot. Students must keep a balance between study and play. People can play happily only when they had finished their works. So are students. I found out the advantages of both individual and collaborative works. Work individually could make things clear and let every one understand the whole thing. Work with someone else can also help a lot. For example, some students were too noisy and did not want to study, we could ask them to be quiet together so it would not be a mess. They could hardly behave badly when facing so many people. The teaching was successful. This experience could make me know about how to be a good teacher and the skills to teach students. It was good to me if I want to be a teacher in the future. It also improve the cooperate skills of the whole class.

I also went to my dad’s company to teach some of the workers English. They were good and willing to improve their English. I was impressed by those people.

These volunteer works made me feel great and I was glad I had these experiences.

Christmas Concert

On December 31, GCA held up a Christmas concert on the third floor of cafeteria. We were all very excited about it and we were looking forward to seeing some great shows.

There was another reason to be excited for me was that I was going to have a performance with my friends this night. I was not only happy but also very nervous. Waiting for the show was the most difficult thing and I was trembling a little bit when I was waiting. I told my partners to calm down and myself too.

It was the time for us to show. We sang the famous Christmas song called “Winter Wonderland” and the most important part was our dancing. We spent much time on thinking about the dance and practiced for a few weeks. It made us to change the steps again and again. We were dead if we did not succeed. When I stepped onto the stage I feel the lights were a bit dazzling but soon I adapted to them and I felt better. There were so many people looking at us and waiting for us. We just started singing and dancing happily. I think we did a good job and it was enough to make people to clap their hands even if they just wanted to encourage us.

It was a good time and to be nervous is very normal before a show. I learnt to calm down and hold the chance to do the things best. Anyway, it was an interesting experience to me.

P.E 10

Mandarin 10

Science 10

Planning 10

Art 10

Happy Trash

Math 10

Social Studies 10

English 10

Great works

On Feb. 28th, my mom and I went to an exhibition near city centre. It is called "Chao tian palace" and it is very famous.
This exhibition includes different kinds of treasured artwork. There are sculptures, clothes, jewelries, etc. They are amazing. Every artwork has a long interesting history. I saw a big strange cart. It's called "Drum mileometer vehicle". It is made of wood and there are also two wooden men sitting on the top of the cart. This kind of cart is an ancient Chinese vehicle with a wooden figure beating the drum to indicate traveled. It is also used by the guard of honour in imperial processions.
The exhibition shows the medicine too. There is a box of red pills and it is used to make people live healthier and longer. It's interesting. My favorite artwork is a tiny carriage which is made of bamboo, silk and wood. It is really small and wonderful. It has two wooden wheels by the side of the carriage. There is a silk top above the carriage which is used to keep the off sunshine. I can imagine that a carter sit in front of it and drive the horse to move it. This carriage must be made very carefully. It looks so beautiful that I stayed there for a long time. There are many other things are like this such as a wooden boat. It also shows lots of rolls of paintings. The paintings are really great and they are all very long. I saw a roll and there are many people on it. They have different jobs and they are working differently. Some people are fixing the shoes, some people are barbers and some are cooking, etc. Everybody has his/her own characteristics. It is a great work.
I like this exhibition because every single artwork has its own meaning. Everthing is made carefully. I took a lot of photos.

Blind School

I went to a blind school almost every weekend. The students there affected me a lot. They are more hard-working than the most students of the normal schools. I found this school very different from others.

When the first time I got there to be a volunteer with my friends, we met a little boy in grade one. We played and chatted with him. I found he is very different. I guess if a handicapped person has a special spirit which normal person doesn’t have. The boy’s hometown is far from here and his parents never come to see him. I thought it was dreadful but he seemed very happy all the time and doesn’t have anything to worry. This is great. He does not care but he still loves his parents. He said his parents must be very busy. The boy has his own dream and nothing can stop him. He was exited and asked us to tell stories to him. We told many little stories and fairy tales and we had no more stories to tell so I decided to bring a story book next time.

There was another person made me surprised. I taught this girl English and she was surprising. She chatted with me first and I knew she was 14 years old but she only in grade 5. It was not strange because it is difficult for them to learn. She took out her English book and read the sentences so that I could check out the mistakes. She told me that she wants to learn the course of grade 6 because she hopes to skip the grade. She asked if I could help her. I consented. I found the text books of Grade 6 at home and taught her some lessons. She was clever and worked hard. The girl also told me that she does not want to be a normal blind person. It meant she doesn’t want a job like massaging as most blind man. She likes singing and she wants to be a singer.

The children there are more active and talkative but well-behaved. Although they love playing but they know when to stop. They are absolute paragons. I learnt many things from them. They have lots of worthy spirits deserve to learn such as their confidence, effort… The very important thing is that they are not self-abased. They are polite and have good manners.

After these volunteer works I understand the skill to be a competent volunteer. It’s to take people’s words seriously and respect them. When I stayed with someone alone, I tried my best to answer all the questions. When I worked with others, we chatted and played together. I am happy to have these good experiences. They are good for me and my future. It can help me do better on many things in the future. I think I should often improve myself on employability skills because I will deal with these kinds of thing normally. I must be more active and ask people if they need my help.

Basketball Team

This is the first term that I came to GCA and I become stronger than before. We have a lot of chance to exercise at GCA. There are many PE lessons and physical activities. Students can join them and train themselves. I joined Basketball team.

Many people love playing basketball but I did not like it at first. In the beginning of the term, my good friend asked me to join the Basketball club. She told me basketball is really a kind of interesting sports. I thought, “why not?” I could learn something.

My friend did not know how to play either so we learnt from the easiest part. First, Mr. Saxby (our coach) taught us how to dribble and the rules of the match. He trained all of the members as clear as possible. I did not know anything about the basketball but I understand a lot after I had the class. We had classes three times a week and I felt I did better in dribbling and many other things.

After many weeks there came the match. We were going to play against the GCA in Jiaxing and Hang Zhou International School. We were both very nervous and excited. We played against HIS first but they were too strong to play with us. They were trained well and seemed learnt for a long time. Their movements were perfect and had great teamwork. That was why they could play so well. The higher grade members played most of the time of the match. I also played for some time and I felt it was so wonderful to stand on the court and take part in the match with team mates. We put effort on one thing together that was to win the game though we were lost at last. I was exhausted but happy to join this game. This was a good experience to me.

We played against Jiaxing GCA later. I was less nervous and hope to get into the game more. Jiaxing GCA was not strong and they were not as good as our team. I played more than last time and I had more confidence. Mr. Saxby talked to everyone about what they should do. This time we won easily. Although we could not win the champ but we won one at least. I was so happy.

I learnt a lot from this match. We must have team spirit and be serious with it. HIS was a good example. We should learn more from them.

We had another match after a few weeks. Our team did better than before and won again. I was glad to see it. I believe we will be stronger and stronger. If we want to win the score while we are playing the match, we must look at the goal and trust ourselves. It is important to be brave in the match because we are going to catch the ball from the offence. Teamwork is the most important. In basketball lesson, we did not only practice basketball in many ways but also exercise like running or frog jumping.

I like basketball now and it maybe fit me because it needs much passion. I think it is good to do this sport. It's fun to play and also makes ourselves healthier.

Marketing Team

This term I joined several clubs such as Treasure Exchange Club, Basketball team, Marketing team, Volunteer Club and Fun Club. Joining clubs is really a good thing for us students. We can learn many skills and have fun.

Marketing team is a helpful club for us. I learnt a lot from it. Entering this club is very strict because we must write a resume of ourselves and translate an article from which it gives. I tried my best to do all those works and I succeed at last. It was very difficult because there were only six people in Grade 10 can be enrolled and I was lucky to be one of them.

The organizer of this team is Mr. Gallinelli because he is in charge of making the whole school better. We had a lot of meetings about the school like uniforms, parents meetings, etc. these things. On November 10 to 12, the first parents meeting of grade 10, 11 and 12 of this term, all of our marketing team members dressed formally. In the beginning, we had to welcome all the parents and take them to the hall because they did not know the way. We also gave hand-out to them too. I stood with my classmate and was waiting for the parents. I found it was interesting to see different people and give the hand-out. I pointed the way to the hall for them. When there were a lot of people, I took them to the stairs to the hall by myself. It was a really great experience and I enjoyed it very much. This could help us be more organized. It gave us confidence and made us do everything better. We kept doing this for three days and I did not feel very tired but happy.

We also helped with GCA newspapers. I interviewed Michael Zhu who graduated in 2007. I sent e-mail to him and asked several questions about his university. He wrote a long article and talked about how he chose universities. Michael is studying at McMaster University and his major is International Business. He introduced his city which he is living and he likes his life there but he feels tired sometimes. Michael also gave us some advices to learn better: train yourself to take notes in class and practice English more in the school. I learnt many things from what he replied.

I also did many other things. We thought about the new GCA uniforms and gave advices. We can translate for teachers in the meetings too. The most of these things were done by higher grade students because they have more experiences and we are just in grade 10 now. Members of this team are professional and they made the club strong in introducing the school. Although it is very good but there is still a small problem that is maybe we should ask other schoolmates’ advices sometimes. It will be great for working better. In the future, when I am in higher grades, I will help more with those things.

Anyway, I am happy that I joined the Marketing team. It teaches me how to be organized and trust myself. Students can contribute to school to make it more beautiful, more organized and better in much other kind of stuffs. This club is also good for entering universities I think. I am looking forward to doing the works for the school next term.