For the 20-something blonde German student Daniela Blank, it was very hard to wave goodbye to her little students in her volunteer project in town.

 

Blank came to Shanghai as a volunteer via the international YMCA network to teach 8- to 12-year-old students in the summer class in Shanghai free of charge.

 

"They are so sweet that I will always remember their smiling faces," sighs Blank.

 

She is leaving Shanghai for Hong Kong next week and then will return to Hamburg University to continue her studies as a Sinology major. Blank says: "Last Friday was my last day with all my students; their songs and the cards they painted for me almost move me to tears."

 

On that day, the 30 students Blank had taught at the Dapu Community Center in Luwan District gave her a mini farewell party. Some performed the song Do-Re-Me; some staged a modern version of children theater Snow White, and some painted many beautiful cards with their crayons.

 

"I love the cards very much and will bring all of them home. I am so easy to recognize on them, because I am the only blonde. The students all paint me in fair-hair-and-blue-eyes," she says. "But it's not just their painting; it's also their words that have touched me deeply."

 

In the card from a student named William, he wrote: "I love you very much teacher, and thank you so much always playing with me." Blank explains that William is an "out-of-the-crowd" kind of child who is very smart and active.

 

"He is always crying out, 'I know how to spell the word, and let me help you', and he really will rush to the blackboard to write down the words for me. He is acting as a little teaching assistant for me," Blank says smiling.

 

Blank's 30 students are divided into two groups - a younger group and an elder group - with 15 in each.

 

From Tuesday to Friday, Blank taught the students at the community center in the afternoon, and she halved the time, teaching the younger group first, then the elder group.

 

"For each group, I also divide them into two, and design games for them, such as memory games or Bingo games," she explains.

 

For memory games, Blank made hundreds of cards. On each card, there is a vivid picture of a word, for example, for the word "slow", Blank chose a comic figure of tortoise to suggest the meaning of "slow" to her students.

 

After teaching the children the word "slow" with the aid of the card and the explanation of the Chinese volunteers working as her assistants, Blank will ask the students to find the card marked with the tortoise and then pronounce the word "slow".

 

"I divided the 15-student groups again into several mini-groups and organized competitions using the memory games," she explains.

 

Zhang Xiaoyue, the secretary of Shanghai YMCA, says: "Each year, four to five university students from Europe will come to Shanghai. They are interested in doing social work together with Chinese volunteers."

 

While Blank helped the children learn English, her Chinese partners - who are also student volunteers - taught her Chinese and calligraphy.

 

(China Daily August 31, 2007)