In July 2018, I spent two weeks at NYC’s China Institute, working as a Teaching Assistant in their NYC Day Camp! I got the job through the head of the China Institute’s teaching program, Dr. Shenzhan Liao, who I met at the CIUS Center’s Annual Gala. She was very sweet and liked the idea of having me help the teachers!
For two weeks, I worked with the teacher of the advanced group and the 7-14 year old kids on lessons about the landscape of China, calligraphy, making dumplings and even a noodle-making class!
Jingrong Yao. me, and Shenzhan Liao
We started the week doing lessons on the geography of China, teaching the kids new words, how to write them, watching videos and more! The teacher introduced me by showing my video from the CIUS Center Awards speech, which was funny and a little weird!
I got to teach a class in calligraphy, which the kids really enjoyed. They took home their works of art and were so proud of what they could do! Later that week, I got to do a dumpling class which was also a lot of fun! We did something crazy too, and made dumplings filled with M&Ms! (I don’t think this was very traditional!)
from the Chinese Calligraphy class
cleanup time at the Calligraphy class
Later in the week, Shenzhan was so nice and let me have some time off on Friday so that I could go to the UN and meet Ambassador Nikki Haley. You can read that story here!
When the two weeks came to an end, Shenzhan presented me with a China Institute t-shirt!
And I was interviewed about the Summer Camp, which was a great opportunity for kids to learn about China, its culture and language. I’d love to do this again someday!
Here’s the video:
The China Institute’s Summer Camp has a blog if you’d like more information. You can see it here!
Thank you, China Institute for a great experience!
I will be doing more teaching this year, working on weekends at The Central Virginia Chinese School, a school for heritage kids.!