News

Over the Spring holidays, Chengsheng Sun and Sharon Brodie were lucky enough to participate in the “Engage with Asia” Immersion Program in China.  Together with 15 other teachers and principals from South Australian Catholic Schools, we visited the cities of Xian, Chengdu and Mt Emei. Through visiting, significant cultural and historic sights we learnt about the city of Xian and toured the Terracotta Warriors, the Xian Old City Wall, and the Wild Goose Pagoda. In the City of Chengdu, with the assistance of our Sister school hosts we visited Wuhou Temple, Du Fu Cottage, and Samantabhadra Temple in Mt Emei.

The highlight of the trip is the two days with our Sister School and the teachers from Chengdu.  We visited The Primary School Attached to Chengdu Experimental Foreign Languages School.  Our hosts Catherine (Liu Lin), Vivian (Cheng Longdan) and Joy (Li Honghong) took wonderful care of us.  On the first day we visited tourist areas and had dinner with a student from the school Wendy (Qinwen Yang) and her gracious family at their apartment.  We ate so many beautiful home cooked dishes. On the second day we visited the schools and classrooms.  Mrs Brodie presented some maths lessons to year 5 and year 2, and Mr Sun shared with some year 5 students his experiences in Australia going to University in Adelaide and then his first year as a teacher.  We also participated in a PE lesson doing Kung Fu!

We were presented with some beautiful artwork created by the school’s art teacher which will be on display in the school soon.  We participated in a Symposium at Shangdong Primary School Attached to Sichuan Normal University, learning about delivery of language learning (both English and Chinese) and work being undertaken by both countries to make the learning more authentic and deeper.  We are looking at ways we can integrate what we learnt into the curriculum at Tenison Woods College.  Mention must be made of the wonderful work Chengsheng has been doing with our Sister School with video conference shared classrooms between our Middle School and the Chengdu Primary School classrooms.  It was a wonderful opportunity to discuss these in detail and plan for future learning activities for all the students.

All too soon it was time to head home via our last school (the Sichuan Bright Foreign Language School) and a quick visit to some Hot Springs.  Whilst we noted many differences in policy and procedures, we found so many enduring similarities between educators wanting the best for the next generation in both Australia and China.  We also noted the similarities in children’s joyous wonder and spirit across the world which made this such a joyous and life-giving experience.

Sharon Brodie | Mathematics Teacher and Year 8 Wellbeing Coordinator

Chengsheng SUN | Chinese Language Teacher