• Welcome to this blog where I will be sharing some of my experiences of teaching in China.

It seems like just yesterday that I arrived in China (August 2017) with my then 13 year-old. Having left the UK and his older grown-up siblings, the adventure we had dreamt about for the past 10 years was finally unfolding. It felt strange; not that I was a stranger to working abroad and being an expat, as I had done a stint in North Africa. But this time it was my son and me, alone in this totally foreign country. Through his experience of learning the language and the culture, he really enjoyed the time he spent here before returning to the UK for A levels in 2020.

However, back to the strangeness of arriving in China. When I started looking seriously to move abroad again – I had not envisioned teaching in China due to the language- I had already spent many years trying to learn Arabic, and although I managed to learn enough to get me by – I did not keep up with it unfortunately.  Starting the process again seemed very daunting and exhausting! I had imagined Spain, Italy or Sweden as the furthest I would venture. Malaysia did hold some exciting prospects too. Somehow, I choose China and thanks goodness I did!

The city of Yantai, Shandong province is on the North-East coast, practically half way between Shanghai and Beijing as the crow flies. This town is wonderful. We are in the EDTZ area- (Economic, Development and Technology Zone) and walking distance to the beach. It’s like a holiday town that is not spoilt by shops and amusements- the beauty of the sea is enough of an attraction for people to come and walk, play, sunbath and dig for crabs and many more culinary delights that are attractive to the Chinese population. Not to say there aren’t hotels and shops- there are many really great hotels and a few shops popping up with an 8-mile beach promenade- it’s called the ‘Golden 8 mile’ and it truly is. We manage to cycle along the promenade at least weekly; the view and calmness it instills never, ever gets tiresome.

School wise- there is only one other international style school in Yantai- this one teaches the American curriculum and is popular with the Korean students. However, my school still has a high number of Korean students along with Chinese as we teach the UK curriculum alongside the Chinese National curriculum. It makes for a busy year but it is possible; many of the students- those who have family help and the desire to learn- excel, and end up in their desired UK/USA or other top international university of choice.

Teaching in an international school is very interesting and I won’t pretend it does not have its difficulties. Some schools have their own politics and cronyism and nepotism in varying degrees. This is not specific to China in any regards – it seems to be a feature of international education in some parts of the world. Sometimes this is because of challenges in recruitment or management style or teacher retention.

However, although there is a touch of that in our school, it doesn’t affect the teaching and learning too much. I am very happy here and have made a life that suits me. My students are wonderful characters and make the teaching easy in a way. I do sometimes feel sorry for new students as we do not have an effective ESL or SEN department. Parents are often of the mind that once their child is enrolled – they expect only A grades in English subjects regardless! This is a constant hurdle that we have to deal with.

Roll onto 2021- after 4 years of teaching and the experience of the Covid-19 pandemic, my view has not changed too much. The children are still working hard and still wonderful, many of my 1^st years class have moved on to either a Chinese local school after primary and some have gone to Canada, USA, Korea and Vietnam; mostly due to parents work issues.  Student retention has been an issue due to Covid -19 and a range of new issues that have occurred over the past year. Overall, apart from my role changing to Head of Primary, I am still teaching and enjoying the sun and the Yantai beach.

In the next blog- you can read about PBL in Primary – with success stories and how the students’ reflections have improved other areas of their learning.