A Quick Overview
(A NOTE: School change over sometimes from year to year. Please read all the reviews at the end of this post if you are considering applying to teach at Country Garden Shunde. I was a teacher here in 2010, but it seems many changes have taken place since then. ESL reader boards would be a good place to get updated information on the situation. If you are looking into other international schools in that area, CLIFFORD is also a good school/country club/resort to check out. I wrote this blog so others would have some idea of what teaching at Country Garden in Shunde, China, was like and that no one would be as unprepared as I was the first time I taught here in 1994.)
Country Garden Shunde (because now there are many Country Garden schools all over China) provides teachers with pretty good apartments with air-con, fridges, washers, plug-in space heaters, bedding.. etc. . The teaching program has become more and more international. I taught at GCGIS in 2009, but I am sure many more Western-style adjustments in the school and teacher living accommodations have been made since then. (Now you get an apartment stipend.)
It is a private school, and a boarding school at that, so behavioral issues come up. (In my experience it was the teachers' kids that were some of my most challenging--albeit most lovable--students and sources of frustration.) It's good to come with a plan, a behavioral system with rewards and disciplines. Use lots of media and activities if you can (with simple instructions) and come fired up. They will love you if you love them. But expect to have to deal with some behavioral stuff.
The kids are used to learning through a lot of media, (TV's connected to computer/Internet) so be ready to get technical. It helps to learn to trouble-shoot computer/TV hook-ups before you are in front of a class and your computer disconnects from the tv or Internet so you can't give the lesson you spent 2 hours preparing for the night before. Ug. Have some kind of worksheet ready in case that happens. Maybe now CG has enough crayons for
everyone in the class to use. (haha)
When I was there in '09, every teacher was given a computer to use for the year. There is wireless internet in the teacher apartments. (At the time, wireless internet was unreliable in the classrooms, but maybe that's been fixed by now.) They have a technical department at the school to help you with your computer and any repairs it might need along the way. I can't remember if we paid a small deposit for the computer at the beginning of the year, but that seems likely.
The non-international side (the Chinese private school side) is a different experience. Classes are taught in the more traditional Chinese way. More rote lessons. Less activities. Less projects on the walls. If you have to teach on that side, well, you might be treated as more of a 'token English teacher' than a serious professional who is going to forever influence young minds. But, you are teaching at a good private school compared to others in China nonetheless.
[My friend came from teaching at a Korean language school in Northern China where they stopped paying their teachers mid-way through the first semester. Three girls shared an apartment and there wasn't the foreign liaison help that CG has. What else. The school closed down around January and left teachers scattering for work at other schools, some with visa problems unresolved. Indecent.]
Working at Guangdong Country Garden International School~
Teaching/Classes:
Things to be ready for:
So many classes - students look similar (be ready to create a good class list with names--and even pictures, and write down what the
personality of the class is.) I had two sets of twins that forever got me mixing up my classes.
I found that although classes were divided by age-range (grades) they were then split up by ability. I taught 3rd-5th Grade Reading and Writing. A class would be called Grade 3 and then Class 1, 2, or 3. So, Gr 3-1 Gr 3-2 and Gr 3-3.
This leaves you with an idea of how classes could get confused and how some great classes would be great but then a class or two would have all the lower-ability students (and low self-esteem) who incidentally, had the most challenging behavioral problems--with no hope of splitting them up, that then became my 'Battle for Middle Earth' classes (what it felt like).
For all the wrestling of wills and fierce eyes and holding my breath praying, DEAR GOD! please let them listen to me today! and do what I say.
Having student monitors for each class helps. They can be the ones to make notes of disruptive student behavior and then tell their home room teacher who has been out-of-line and needs some 'follow-up'. The homeroom teacher should be a good support when students' take advantage' of their foreign teacher's kindness, lack of Chinese, etc,. ..
You will have some really bright, wonderful kids in your classes and then some more challenging ones. You get that anywhere you are in the world, but it was harder in China with students' limited English because you can't call on them by name to stop a certain behavior or know if they understand you in the first place.
(Name tags at the beginning helped immensely! Too bad their homeroom teacher didn't make them keep them on their desks all the time. I would recommend insisting on this. They might all be doing this by now though.) Another problem I had was keeping track of the 'good' classes (and those with better English) and the more 'challenging' classes.
I confused the two and was overly strict with the mellow kids (causing them to misbehave) and overly lax with the 'bad' classes (causing them to take advantage). By the end of the year it got better.
If I could do it again, and had the resources, I would have bought my own printer. It was crazy at the time trying to print (an original) from the teacher's office. 1) It seems everyone got the software disk for the printer (to print wirelessly from our lap-tops) except the foreign teachers.
Then the printer software disk disappeared, 2) so we all ended up having to use the printer computer, where we had to switch-up flash drives and unplug keyboards so we could find a USB port to print from. I am sure they have this changed now though. I would hope so.
(But, this is China, so you prepare for the worst and then are pleasantly surprised when the best happens. When they are technically ahead of us and their way of doing things is even more stream-lined than back home...) :]
Living in China:
Surprisingly modern. It was the weather that was the hardest adjustment. Summer/Fall is SO humid. Then, for winter, it just changes like the flip of a coin, going to SO cold/sticky wet. It's supposed to be 'mild' but do not under-estimate the cold or the heat.
The best advice I could give is bring lots of warm fleece, down jackets/comforters and lots of cool cotton clothes for when it heats up again. (You can, however, find clothing in China--the quality stuff is about the same price that we pay in the USA ($30-50 for a good fleece sweatshirt) but if you have the weight allowance and don't want to take any chances, bring some of that with you.
Country Garden:
Living in the 'Country Club'
If you live in the foreign teachers' apartments, you are 5 minutes away from work, there is a small corner store at the bottom of your apartments, a moderate sized everything/grocery store --5 minutes by bus, 15 to walk (has everything from dry goods to veggies, cleaning supplies and even household items) however, to really do some serious living/shopping/eating the closest bigger town is a 20-30 minute bus ride away. I believe it's called Panyu (Pawn-yu). They have malls, night markets, movie theaters, pizza hut, some parks and it's just a great close get-away.
To get there by bus. You will need to take a 5 or 10 minute mini-van bus ride to get to the CG main bus station at the entrance of the Country Club (though all buses are free for CG foreign teachers) and from there it's maybe a 10 minute wait and then at least a 25 minute bus ride to the nearest city. So after a while, it feels like it takes extra energy to get anywhere.
The main big city nearby is Guangzhou. Guangzhou has everything. Malls, Starbucks, buses and trains to Hong Kong,...the airport.
In CG, things weren't as close as I hoped. Maybe if I had a scooter, I wouldn't have felt so isolated at times. But, if the whole overseas adventure/China thing is new, then everything will be pretty exciting. There are some Chinese eateries (cheap-and we all loved them!) within a 20-30 minute walking distance or 5-10 by motorbike.
(I would so RECOMMEND getting a motorbike/scooter while you are in CG. Unless you are really trying to save up to pay off debt or put a down payment on a house, it made everything easier for my friend when she got hers--and the weather (90% humidity times) was not such a downer because you had to walk everywhere.)
Apartments - Foreign Teacher Living
The apartments provided for the foreign teachers are nice--especially compared to the regular teacher apartments. There was marble flooring and some nice 'teak' wood doors and chandelier lighting to spice things up. I seem to remember even soft yellow walls.
Bathroom - Western toilet, modest-sized running-water sink, a glassed-in shower, a mirror and a small set of matching shelves above the sink. There is a smaller window above the shower with a very small plastic exhaust fan, more marble tile and a washing machine if you're isn't outside on a back-porch..
For other things that we needed, there is an IKEA in the city (Guangzhou) which we loved to go to. (It's PACKED on Sunday though. All the Chinese come out and try out the beds and curtains and stuff. It's a mess! :] I love how they get into it.)
There was no full-sized mirror in the apartment, so a few of us got 4 small mirrors and posted them together on the wall. There might be a closer store where you can get a long mirror by this time. Also, some of the apartments will have stuff left behind from previous foreign tenants.
If you take stuff back from GZ (Guangzhou) in a taxi all the better. We were saving money at the time, so hauled things back on the Guangzhou metro and CG buses. A little more awkward, but it worked.
The Kitchen- Small fridge (2-feet tall?) and microwave with gas-powered cooking stove-top and a kettle. Yes, you had to turn open the gas-tap on the bottle of propane that you had in your house for hot showers and cooking. It would have to be replaced by a maintenance man 2x during the year.
We had to pay for the propane. It wasn't too much. (50-150 yuan? for each bottle) Also, although most of the place is well-lit, some kitchens don't have a window--depending on which way your apartment is facing. It also had some cupboards a stainless steel sink and a long countertop. In general, a very small area--like cooking in a hallway.
Living Room - floor-to-ceiling glass windows on one side. These are also your balcony doors. (There is a cement balcony off each apartment.) A couch, a cabinet, a coffee table, a desk and a chair. Furniture was mostly shellacked wood--very rustic. It also came with a a tv and a dvd player.
Bedroom - A nice window, usually a full-size/queen bed, (The mattress would be equivalent to what we call a box spring) tall wooden shelf, bedside table/cabinet, curtains (very light and barely cover the window)
Bedding--a duvet coverlet with pillowcase, a thick comforter and a towel.
The place didn't come with any floor mats, hangers, kitchen utensils/towels, cleaning mops/buckets or other household-y things. These you needed to buy yourself, but at least there were stores around that had them.
We had bottled water delivered. Bless the man! who only charged 5 yuan extra to carry the 5-gallon bottle of drinking water up to your apartment--whether you lived on the 1st floor or the 8th floor. I usually needed another bottle every 2-3 weeks.
[In China, after 9 floors, they have to put in an elevator. So, the teacher apartments--and the kids' dorms as well--will go up 9 floors without an elevator. The view is great! But the stairs 4x-8x a day will make you very fit.)
CG foreign teachers get a housing allowance. You can chose to live outside of the teacher's apartments in other country garden apartments or homes (I don't know how much the allowance covers) or high rise apartments with elevators and some of the nicer features of the teacher apartments--teak doors, chandeliers...)
Foreign Liaison
Good and fair. Mr. Lee, if he is still there, has been in the 'business' for many years and is great. He will be your advocate. (Compared to other Chinese Foreign Advisors in stories I've heard.)
(The latest I have heard is that Mr. Lee is in a different position now-2016.)
Foreign Liaison ASSISTANT
She was awesome!! Awesome! It made our time in China so much easier. She was our go-to girl for visa needs airport pick-ups, practical apartment things/fix-ups and anything else out of the box that we foreigners could think of. We were careful though, not to abuse the privilege of having such a wonderful helper on our side. We tried not to overwhelm her with too many requests or questions at once.
Requests: If a few of us were wondering about the same thing, we would try to just send her one text instead of all of us e-mailing her at once, if we could help it. But, if a light blew out in your apartment or your air-con stopped working, we let her know right away and that was fine. She would schedule a maintenance man to come fix it and try to take care of as many apartment problems in one shot.
[Now, this was if you were in the foreigner apartment block. If you lived outside of the area, you probably had another apartment manager to send maintenance requests to.]
Getting Paid:
Always on-time. A big organization so that one is a constant. They pay you in yuan and deposit it straight to your bank. The green Agricultural Bank of China is what they used. They would take out 'electricity costs' and some apartment deposits from your paycheck, but that was in our contract.
There is something with China, where you get paid 1-2 months after you first start working. It's hard to wait that long if you need to set up your household, but I think CG gave a 1/2 amount for our first pay period and then we got the difference at the end of the year. (As in, it works out that you get paid 2 paychecks for your last paycheck because your first one comes a little late. It's something like that. But it's all fair in the end.)
I hope that helps and gives a basic idea of what it's like to work for Guangdong Country Garden International IB School.
