Home \ Project News \ Gu Yandong From Stay-at-home Mom to PPI
Author: Gu Yandong, a PPI of Manduo PPC
Like other people in the village, Gu Yandong has been living her own life, going to school, getting married and having children has been completed without stopping.
At the age of 35, Gu Yandong was already the mother of two children. In addition to taking good care of her children's daily life, she takes her children to the activity places in the village to play with other children of the same age every day. The village activity place is the most lively place in the village, because there are some exercise machinery and equipment here, which can not only be used for the villagers to exercise in their leisure time, but also allow the children in the village to get together and share the toys . However, whenever there is a wedding or a larger event in the village where people get together to eat and celebrate,, the village activity place must be vacated because guests are to be entertained. During the busy farming season, parents in the village don't trust their children to stay at home alone, so they will choose to take them to the fields and let them play with mud in the fields.
At that time, Gu Yandong thought that it would be nice if there was a place where children could play together without being disturbed and parents could rest assured.
In 2022, HPP went to several towns and villages in Tengchong to conduct needs surveys, and finally decided to carry out the Scientific Parenting and Child Development Project in 6 villages in 2 towns and villages. Manduo Village, where Gu Yandong is located, was among them.
Under the introduction of the village Committee, Gu Yandong became a PPI in the parenting and play center and the first group of practitioners of the project. The transition from a full-time mother to a child-rearing instructor was a challenge for Gu Yandong, but she was vaguely expecting it because she also wanted to grow.
Gu Yandong, who just joined, knows very little about the project, except that there is finally a good place for children in the village. Not only are there many toys, but children and parents no longer need to bring their own toys, and during the busy farming season, children don't just play with mud in the fields. In the subsequent pre-job training and monthly training, Gu Yandong gradually became familiar with and understood the project, and also gained a new self from the project.
Gu Yandong's parenting and play center is open four days a week and five hours a day. In the parenting and play center, she will carry out activities according to independent exploration, concentrated joint activities, outdoor activities and scientific parenting. Through reading picture books, making handicrafts, playing with toys, outdoor observation and other activities, children are guided to develop their ability to use their hands and brains. At the same time, there are two scientific parenting classes held every week, which convey the concept of scientific parenting to caregivers in an easily understandable way to fill the blank of scientific parenting experience for rural parents.
When using scientific parenting methods to bring up children in the village, Gu Yandong also applied the theories and methods she learned to her own children. Before she became a childcare instructor, she was a full-time mother. Like other ordinary mothers, she just wanted her children to eat well, sleep well and be healthy every day. After being a PPI, Gu Yandong realized that children not only need to eat well, sleep well and be healthy, but also need the companionship and correct guidance of their parents, shifting from taking care of their bodies to taking care of their hearts. Therefore, whenever the parenting and play center carries out activities, Gu Yandong will take her youngest child with her and play and study with other children in the activity center. When Gu Yandong popularized scientific parenting knowledge for parents, not only did parents learn it, but she also constantly consolidated the knowledge she had learned and worked hard for herself as an excellent caregiver.
This year is the second year for Gu Yandong as a PPI. In the past two years, she didn't know anything from the beginning. She was afraid of doing activities and was not confident when communicating with her parents. Now she can skillfully carry out activities, actively communicate with her parents about parenting difficulties and help them solve problems. The children and parents in the activity center have also changed a lot compared with the beginning. Children's running and jumping, hands-on, brain-thinking, language and physical ability have all improved obviously, and parents' concept of parenting has also changed. They are more inclined to educate their children with scientific theoretical methods, and they also prefer to take their children to activity centers to carry out activities.
As the first group of PPI of the project, Gu Yandong is also growing while the project is mature. From Stay-at-home mother in the countryside to a child-rearing instructor, it is not only an working opportunity for Gu Yandong, but also an opportunity for Gu Yandong to give herself a new capacity.
"I want to embrace more children with concrete love, so that children in rural areas can grow up scientifically! "
Project introduction:
The Tengchong Genwell-HPP Community Center project is supported by GenWell Foundation and Planet Aid Inc. In cooperation with Tengchong Women's Federation and Tengchong Education and Sports Bureau, the project opens village-level Parenting and Play Centers, recruits and trains Parenting and Play Instructors and aims to promote scientific parenting concepts and skills, improve community family education guidance services, strengthen scientific parenting publicity and advocacy, promote family construction and healthy development of children, and achieve sustainable development of rural children aged 0-4.
This project is supported by the Genwell Foundation.
This article represents the views of the author and does not represent the views or positions of the donor.