Path of Happiness: Encountering the Joyful Times of Rural Countryside
Text and photos / Quality Off-Campus Education Promotion Alliance, Zhang Weiliang, Director of General Affairs, Hulin Elementary School, Hsinchu City
One opportunity x one stroke of fate x five encounters x five kinds of life experience
Shuttling in and out of school, searching between hearts
When students... do not feel like going to school
When lessons... are no longer this interesting
When teaching... cannot stay stuck and unchanged
When teachers... do not want to go on like this...
The "farming course" gave Hulin Elementary School in Hsinchu City an opportunity
Find money, and there is money - a chance encounter with off-campus funding from the Ministry of Education and a special appropriation from the farmers' association, providing sponsorship.........heaven's timing
Find land, and there is land - the former president of the parents' association kindly provided half a fen of farmland................earth's advantage
Find people, and there are people - conveniently joining in a teacher professional learning community and enthusiastic elderly farmers from the community, allowing diverse expertise to be integrated.......human harmony
A fortunate coincidence, bringing "plan" and "change" together - that is a kind of fate
Perhaps this is happiness! So the people of Hulin call this piece of farmland - Happiness Manor
Store5 Encounter | The life of service
Knowledge & life, learning & action, becoming the most beautiful encounter
The manor's little guide activity mainly encourages students to move from understanding much knowledge, internalizing it, to externalizing spoken expression ability, presenting a form of integrated learning. Its training process is divided into three stages, including class-wide sea training, stress testing, and the official debut.
Class-wide sea training means every student tries to be a little guide, giving themselves a chance to speak fluently in front of everyone about their understanding of the manor and what they have learned from it. Then comes the stress testing zone, which uses the manor site or the ancient farm tool display area for on-site practice, simulating a guiding scenario. The instructing teacher will also pose questions at any time, testing the guide's on-the-spot reactions.
The third stage is the official debut. On the day of the school anniversary ceremony, they serve as guides at the manor exhibition area, introducing the whole story of the manor's development and answering questions and confusion from parents and children throughout the school, truly becoming the most dazzling service angels in the anniversary event!
A child who took part as a little guide left these words on a blog.....
I do not know whether this year's sports day will be rainy or sunny, but I believe that no matter what the weather is like, the little guides of Happiness Manor must do a good job! Only then will we win glory for Hulin.
Five kinds of encounters produced five kinds of life experience with different atmospheres: what textbooks do not mention; what cannot be made clear in the classroom; what is not concrete enough in teaching and learning. On the small road leading to the manor, you see enough at one glance, understand at one listen, and learn clearly at once. Perhaps this is the greatest charm and magic of "Encounter x Happiness Road"!