{"id":28214,"date":"2016-12-31T11:05:05","date_gmt":"2016-12-30T22:05:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nzcfs.adminmouse.co.nz\/?p=28214"},"modified":"2017-01-10T05:21:13","modified_gmt":"2017-01-09T16:21:13","slug":"dodie-is-going-back-to-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/dodie-is-going-back-to-china\/","title":{"rendered":"Dodie is going back to China!"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Dodie
Dodie Johnston<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Back in 2012, the New Zealand China Friendship Society published an\u00a0article<\/a>\u00a0based on several interesting e-mails that Dodie Johnston sent us about her experiences when teaching at Hwa Nan Women\u2019s College in Fuzhou, Fujian province. Dodie tried to set her own personal stories against the background of Chinese culture and neighborhood activities in hopes of giving the reader a richer view of everyday life in this intriguing country.<\/p>\n

Since then she has published a book \u2018How was China?<\/strong><\/em>\u2018, about Hwa Nan Women\u2019s College\u00a0and her experiences teaching there. Within a framework of\u00a0the history of the College, Dodie includes many vignettes about the lives of her Chinese students, which gives an overview of social life in China, a country that has gone from a feudal state to a world power in only a century. Having started teaching there in 2000 and returning every other year until 2011, Dodie says in the Epilogue of her book that she would not go back to China and gives her reasons why.<\/p>\n

But now, in her\u00a0amusing and informative blog<\/a>, Dodie explains why she\u00a0is<\/em>\u00a0going back and some of the difficulties in achieving that. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Once there, she returns to her old haunts, finds many of them gone or altered beyond recognition. What she also finds is that lowered college admission standards have lead to a different student demographic and attempting to teach Applied English to young people with very basic language skills is an increasingly difficult challenge. There\u2019s been a shift in major choices, too. Applied English majors who were formerly yearning for positions in an international trade company now aspire to be teachers. Why? Stability\u2026one of the most valued concepts in China. With the economy slowing, the one-child policy abolished and the world wobbling on a changing political axis, schools are seen as a safe source of employment.<\/p>\n

A new industry in private kindergartens and after-hours \u201ctraining schools\u201d for elementary and high school students is also supported by parents who want their kids to edge out the competition.<\/p>\n

Looking around Fuzhou, Dodie sees a city that is trying to restore some of its cultural heritage along with its modernization. The new combination of leisure time and disposable income have spawned such novelties as DIY baking shops and drumming \u201cclubs\u201d where sound-insulated rooms can be rented for practice. Her blog supplies pictures and vignettes that take the reader along as she visits puppet shows, match-making markets and a rural island transformed into an international shopping paradise for Taiwanese. She also gives info about her book on the website.<\/p>\n

Dodie Johnston is an American Licensed Educational Psychologist, who worked in public elementary schools prior to teaching in China. \u00a0She has written articles for local newspapers and magazines wherever she has lived, as well as endless psycho-educational reports. \u00a0She lives in the Sierra Nevada foothills of northern California where she is a member of Sierra Writers. Her book is now available on Kindle<\/a> and has been featured in the superb\u00a0magazine ‘Translating China\u00a0<\/em>‘ [Dodie’s article is in\u00a0Vol 2 No 1<\/a>, Page 50]. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Please contact her at\u00a0howwaschina@hotmail.com<\/a>, or via her Facebook page \u2018How Was China?<\/a>\u2018.<\/p>\n

\"dodoie-blog-header\"<\/p>\n

– Duncan France<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back in 2012, the New Zealand China Friendship Society published an\u00a0article\u00a0based on several interesting e-mails that Dodie Johnston sent us about her experiences when teaching at Hwa Nan Women\u2019s College in Fuzhou, Fujian province. Dodie tried to set her own personal stories against the background of Chinese culture and neighborhood activities in hopes of giving […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":28226,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[159],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28214"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28226"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzchinasociety.org.nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}