Education Forum in Guiyang

Well, today we went to the conference that we are really here for. We had no ideas it would be such a big deal. It was held at the Guizhou Normal University which is a university that prepares teachers (among other things). The opening ceremonies were quite elaborate.


We were greeted by two lines of student volunteers playing traditional instruments and dressed in costume.


Others were dancing. One group came forward and offered random people a drink or rice wine out of a horn. I think I am glad they did not offer it to me!! We had a red carpet to walk on when we got to the building where the forum was to be held. There were many students to greet us and they were all eager to try out their English. Our guide told us that they had 100 student volunteers but that 1000 had applied to help out. I wish we could get that kind of motivation at home. Maybe it got them out of class for the day (ha).


We started the forum in a big auditorium. This was marked by MANY speeches from Chinese officials and US counterparts form People to People and other organizations. We had a tea break in the middle where they had snacks and tea and coffee. Many of our group tried a Chinese toilet for the first time. Some refused to do so and stood in line for 20 minutes to use the one Western toilet in the building.

We had to wear a device so we could hear the translator during the speeches. One of the things the forum was doing was to celebrate 30 years of China working with the US. We also heard a little background about the Chinese education system in this province and the steps forward made in the last 30 years.

We walked over to the school cafeteria for lunch. It was very good with all kinds of selections of food to choose from. And, we got to eat on old fashioned cafeteria trays so I could separate my food to my heart’s content.

The afternoon was spent in meetings with just our delegation and some Chinese teachers. Each group did a presentation and then we had an hour or more for open discussion. The Chinese teachers and University educators were very curious about our system. It is really hard to describe our system since every state has its own rules about teacher certification, etc. They also asked us some questions about getting parents involved with their children and what they are working on. We gave suggestions and I hope we were able to give them some good ideas.

From what we can tell, there system in early childhood is mimicking ours but at a slower pace. They also train their teachers to look at the whole child, what is developmentally appropriate and how to stimulate them at an early age. This was certainly a wonderful experience. I gave the university professors three editions of Current Issues in Early Childhood. I don’t know if their English is good enough to read through them or not but I am glad to have those heavy books out of my backpack!! The forum closed with a closing ceremony with a couple more speeches saying how successful the day had been.

We had just enough time to change clothes and then head out to a banquet for the forum participants. There were a couple of speeches and a toast. Then we had a wonderful buffet dinner and some musical performances by students from the university. One of the performances was a minority group that sang without accompaniment. This group really reminded me of one style of singing we heard in Bulgaria. Even the costumes were sort of similar.


You can tell that these groups of people might have been related to each other in the past. It is amazing the way things seem to be interconnected. Sometimes you just have to experience it to see the connections.

The Internet connection was working in the room when we got back but sadly only lasted for about 20 minutes. Again, this posting is very late!!