Field Trip: Caroling in Yuanshan

Silent Night

!A week before Christmas my 105 classes decided to take our singing skills on the road. We brainstormed if any community centers would appreciate our company. As most of the students are from Taipei, we relied on a local student who suggested the Taoist Retirement home Tien Ting Dao Yuan (天庭道院) just across the river. Here are the address and telephone.  Address:  宜蘭縣二結村二結路49-2號 telephone:  (03)9280219

Fax:  (03)9280462

We sang "Silent Night" (in English and Chinese), "Go Tell It on the Mountain" and "Last Christmas". The old people were tickled and I had to encourage (severely) my bashful students to engage and chat with them after our preformance. The teens were sheepish. I had explained in the classroom that their attention and conversation was the real gift, the singing was just a bonus. The elders had plates of cut fruit and bags of little candies they wisely used to coax the kids. Once the ice broke then it all manifested the way I had envisioned.

I love this photo, it looks so timeless.

The retired folks were not shy and loved posing and taking pictures and helping the kids with their otherwise timid colloquial skills.  There were some big extroverts, showing off their Japanese skills and joking in Taiwanese. The more extroverted boys were able to chat with some of the more reserved folks. By an hour neither group wanted to part and we vowed to return (we did the next day.)

It was a thrill to me to see which students who aren't exactly the best academically, shine with their EQ skills. This class has some real sweet-hearted kids. It was abundantly clear to me how 2 dimensional classroom learning really is.

A special thanks to my co-teacher Sue for arranging the details (faxing the home our plan) and timing the walk. Teamwork rules

A male student in the class had been fooling around with origami in between class breaks and taught his classmates how to make reindeer. We gave the old folks a little reindeer origami charm and they placed it as an offering on the later to their god, the fat Budai god of happiness.