The recent China trip was an amazing experience! Our group visited partner schools in the cities of Baoding and Langfang. The schools were very different to ours! Each school had up to 10,000 students and the high schools had boarding facilities which mean the school day ran from 7am to 10pm! Each class had between 45-60 students and they were all really keen to meet us and share their culture with us.
We were introduced to heritage crafts from calligraphy to making laquer fans and from traditional music to tai chi. In addition, the schools were keen to embrace the latest technology showing us rocket building technology and a robot dog. Heidi and Emma were brilliant student ambassadors - they were very patient with all of the students who were fascinated to speak to their first ever foreigners and to communicate using their excellent English. It was an amazing opportunity for us to have a window onto a very different society and to come to a better understanding of the things that we have in common. We look forward to being able to welcome some of the Chinese students to our school in July when they visit us.