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It's the end of an era but, so far, JD appears to be taking it all in his stride. Nonchalant, even!
JD has left his Chinese Primary School for the last time. After 5 years there, he said his goodbyes. He will miss his friends and some of the teachers, but he won't miss the daily 3-4 hours of homework!
The plan, starting today, is for me to home-school him for 6 months, to try and get his English level (spellings in particularly) up to the right level to start in a UK Secondary School in September 2024.
The only exercise JD got during his school's Sports Meeting last week was walking to the stadium and back with his classmates! Athletic prowess isn't really part of JD's skillset. But it meant less homework for a few days, which is always welcome.
 JD's class were chosen to be the guinea-pigs in a maths teaching competition this week. JD is centre in the second row.
After learning the spellings of certain words for ages, he'll take a 5-minute break and then forget them all! But we're very slowly getting there, I think. Very slowly!
JD went on his annual school outing last week - along with half the school (2000+ students). The trip started and ended with a 90 minute journey by coach, with various kids throwing up. The location was just some place housing a handful of animals (pigs, some llamas and a camel) with very little to see and do. The weather was cold and wet.  There was some sort of presentation, but most of the 2000 kids couldn't see or hear anything. It seems that none of the teachers had visited the site in advance and the hosts had been caught unawares by the number of visitors. Kids were unable to do the various craft activities, squeezed 15 to a table. And JD's class had been told not to bring raincoats, so the outdoor activities were mostly cancelled.
JD was so excited beforehand, but returned very disappointed. The one redeeming factor for him was the promise that there would be no homework that day - until three papers came through later in the evening to be completed by the next day! More broken promises. This is the third outing in three years that has been something of a disaster. You'd think the teachers would learn...
JD's homework today included a 300 character essay on why he shouldn't be naughty. Every student in the class had to write one. Why? Because the teacher left the classroom in the middle of a lesson and while she was AWOL for 20 minutes, some of the students were apparently talking...  So the teacher punishes the whole class (guilty and innocent) for HER unprofessional absence, and the punishment is to do some creative writing - in addition to the usual 4-5 hours of regular homework. What sort of lesson is this for kids??
JD's Primary School have been getting really silly yet again about the amount of homework they set. Last night he did 6 hours, finishing at 12.40am this morning. The day before it was 5 hours. We've heard of classmates staying up until 2am to finish. And there's not even an exam coming. I've started using some of my afternoon "English home-schooling" time to let him have an hour's nap, which is not what we had planned at all! The sooner this term finishes the better.  JD probably needed the basketball/dance P.E. session this morning to wake him up.
JD has been working really hard these last few months. The pressure to do well (from the Chinese education system, and from his very competitive class teacher) has been immense. A typical evening has seen him (and Jiajia) working until 10-11pm to finish his homework. JD's Chinese has always been his weakness. Unlike his classmates, he operates in a world where language is split - whilst his schoolwork and homework is all in Chinese, his home life and entertainment tends to be in English. Tough.  After recent grades in mock Chinese exams of 44% and 65%, we were simply hoping for something over 70% for his final exam. But, to our surprise, he managed to get 84% in Chinese, and then 93% in Maths. Finally, a much needed reward for all his hard work. Well done, son!
JD had his end of year English Exam yesterday which included questions like this.... (good luck!)   JD has been maturing quite a lot in recent months. He seems to struggle a little less at school - finding ways to avoid the boredom and do enough to pass his exams (just). His class won the Year 4 Basketball Competition - JD was just cheering - AND the Year 4 Ethnic Dancing Competition (both out of 10 class teams). JD was one of the dancers.  JD's free time has been dominated by fish recently. His two aquariums teem with fish, big and small. But with 1-2 dying every day, we wonder how long it will be before he packs in that hobby! He also has aspirations to be an angler. He bought his third rod and line last week. I get really proud when I see him confidently interacting with "strangers" such as shopkeepers and neighbourhood folk with great confidence and politeness. And all in fluent Chinese, too!
Last week, JD and his class spent many, many hours taking part in a basketball competition between the ten classes in his year. The teachers take it very seriously with girls, boys and mixed teams, and live-streamed matches. By the end, JD's "Class #7" were unbeaten and destroyed their opponents in the final, 21 v 5. JD didn't play at all, but was awarded "No.1 Supporter" for his enthusiastic chanting and encouragement. As a reward, the students in "Class #7" had no homework to do last weekend. JD got home by 7pm on Friday and slept until noon on Saturday - a well-deserved rest!  JD's Primary School sent out a text the other day which, when translated by my phone, read...  "In order to thoroughly study and implement General Secretary Xi Jinping's important statement on education, and cultivate the self-esteem, self-confidence, rationale, peaceful and positive attitude of primary and secondary school students, in accordance with the Guiding Opinions on Strengthening Mental Health Services of 22 Departments such as the National Health and Family Planning Commission (National Health and Disease Control [2016], the Ministry of Education on Printing and Distributing the Guiding Outline of Mental Health Education in Primary and Secondary Schools (Revised in 2012), the Education Leading Group of the Provincial Party Committee, Notice on Printing and Distributing the Work Plan for Preventing and Containing Personal Extreme Events of Students in Yunnan Province and the Notice of the Yunnan Provincial Department of Education, Yunnan Provincial Health Commission and Yunnan Women's Federation on the Evaluation of the Mental Health Status of Primary and Secondary School Students, after research, it was decided to carry out the evaluation of students' mental health status."
 JD's holiday homework and review papers have been ramping up this week as he's back to school next week and looking at taking his end-of-term exams, which were postponed from last semester due to the COVID school closure.
He goes to a private homework class most days and Jiajia gives him extra help where she can. JD only has about a year of Chinese education to go, so it's important to take this opportunity to make his reading and writing as solid as possible before our move to the UK next year. With JD's Primary School having been closed for a month now, his schoolwork is all assigned, handed-in and marked online. Up until last week, he has done this though the day at "Cleaner School" - his after-school club attended by 5-10 students, usually just to do homework but now doing classwork through the day too.  But with COVID ripping through the population now, since the removal of pandemic restrictions, "Cleaner School" has closed down too. JD has had COVID this last week but is now back to 90% health and so the schoolwork continues. Jiajia has to do the Chinese and Maths with him (90% of the total) while I pitch in with English and "generally keeping everyone less stressed"!! The holidays can't come quickly enough!
Yesterday, JD's Primary School class sent out a message requiring all students to create a painting by tomorrow with the theme of "A Chinese Village". The top ten would then be entered into a Provincial Competition. But JD is currently getting home from his Homework Club at 10.00-11.00pm. There really is no time to break open the paints. So JiaJia reluctantly agreed to paint 90% of it on his behalf...  It's taken her many hours to get it finished [see above]. But yesterday, when another parent rang Jiajia for a chat, we found out that the other parents in the class simply pay someone to do their paintings for them. They found it funny that Jiajia actually does it herself! And the school don't seem to care who does it - as long as they get the kudos of winning prizes in the competition. What's the educational purpose of all of this? Maybe just to teach people how to cheat successfully?
 With exams next week, followed by May Day week holiday, last week was the best time for JD's class to have their 6-monthly photo.
JD was awarded a special Certificate at school this week. He had been asked by his teacher to enter a National Art competition about a month ago (celebrating the COP15 Conference held in Kunming last year) and we were all pretty stunned to hear he came top in Yunnan Province and second out of all China!
Admittedly there was a bit of parental help in thinking up the idea and drawing some of the creatures, but that's pretty normal in China, and JD coloured in most of it. So we were all chuffed and JD's Primary School teacher apparently gained a lot of kudos.
JD's Primary School is in a road full of Gingko trees. Their leaves are quite something at this time of year. JD believes the oncoming car in this photo is floating!   JD's class came top of the ten classes in his year in a tug-of-war competition this week. Being the fattest in the class, JD anchored the back of the line and was thrilled at the victory.
JD [bottom left in photo] and his classmates had a series of presentations about planets and space travel this week.  I thought JD would love this as he's very much into tech and spaceships. But he said it was largely about how American rockets are rubbish and the Chinese ones are the best. Must everything be political in schools here?
JiaJia and I challenged JD to an Art Competition last week (to get him off the iPad for an hour or two!). We decided to all draw the same thing (JD chose one of his aeroplane toys) with the best sketch winning a prize [L to R below: Jiajia's, JD's, mine]. Who won, do you think?  JD's schoolteacher is fully aware that Jiajia has a Masters in Art and JD's English is fluent, so she often sends us details of Art/English Competitions for us to enter "for the glory of the school". The painting below was a JJ/JD joint effort for Teacher's Day! 
My University lessons are back in full swing after an unusually long, but very welcome, two month Summer holiday. This was one of my classes earlier this week doing a "Running Dictation" exercise...  The Chinese Government have been rolling out a series of education reforms over recent months to "reduce the burden" on young students in China. These include banning online tutoring with teachers based abroad, removal of western printed textbooks, regulating after-school and weekend training classes and reducing homework and exams in Primary Schools. However, JD's school seem to be largely ignoring the "less work" parts. Completing his daily homework is taking longer than ever. He didn't finish until after after 10pm on Monday/Tuesday, though Wednesday/Thursday were "only" 8.30pm [see below]. Crazy.  This week and next sees JD's end of term exams - so even more stress and homework than usual. His after-school class takes on the brunt of the Chinese and Maths exercises with Jiajia and I giving him a little extra, personalised work at weekends.  JD, front right Recent feedback from JD's teachers are that he is focusing better in class and is much-liked by staff and students alike. We are expecting top marks in English, hoping for a top ten placing in Maths and fearing he'll be bottom ten in Chinese... Fingers crossed!
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 AuthorPaul Hider started this blog to share his rather odd life living in China for over 20 years. Since returning to the UK in 2024, the blog now records his more "normal" lifestyle! Past blog entries
May 2025
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