Teaching English in China

The following is another guest post by Yveline Van Anh 

McDonalds in Beijing

Driving around the roads of Shunyi, Beijing, one would never imagine such things as 10 families sharing a common bathroom or houses without heating and air conditioning. Most of the people I meet here are blinded by the newly opened McDonald’s, Starbucks and modern westernized villa houses which render them oblivious to the fact that just five minutes from their three story houses lie small villages in which entire families live in a single room no bigger than their living room.


I started teaching English at the Love and Hope Center when I was 12 years old, in my freshman year of High School. The Center houses immigrant vocational students from the ages of 16 to 25 and trains them to become dental technicians or kindergarten and elementary school teachers. It also holds weekly English lessons for younger children from immigrant families.

I still remember my first time to the Love and Hope Center. It was in the middle of November, and the temperature was starting to reach just below 0 degrees Celsius. I entered the classroom to find around 10 children sitting on old wooden stools around a large table. They were all wrapped up in large winter coats and some had red runny noses, but they were all smiling as they waited for me to start the lesson.

Most students came with their materials inside a small plastic bag in which they had one or two pieces of paper, a pencil, and sometimes an eraser or pencil sharpener. They sat on broken stools and chairs around an old wooden table. There was a large blackboard in the front of the class with a box of small broken pieces of chalk sitting on a desk next to it. An old piece of cloth was used as an eraser. The door to the classroom would occasionally swing itself open, letting in a current of cold air which made us all shiver. The room was lit by the sun shining through a row of windows on the side of the room.

It surprised me that, despite all these terrible learning conditions, the students – both old and young – all wore large smiles on their faces and were eager to learn. Many of them were truly capable, but unfortunately for them, they will never get the chance to go to university or to pursue a career that they desire. Although the general education situation in China is improving, many children and young adults from rural China are unable to attend university or even finish High School. The older children often have to stay home with their grandparents and work while their parents move to large cities in an attempt to make money as maids or construction workers. Even if education were made free, many children would still be unable to escape from rural life as many still must start work from a very young age.

Despite having lived in Beijing for ten years, the difference between the level of education and standards of living in different parts of China still amazes me to this very day. How can it be that while I get to enjoy heating in winter, others living just minutes from my house must gather under multitudes of blankets and jackets to keep themselves warm? How can it be that while I drive to school every morning, others my age must bike or walk to work? How can it be that the plastic bottles I throw away are someone else’s source of income? How can it be that while I am learning calculus, a boy my age is learning how to become a bus driver? Is it even possible that we live in the same city? Let alone just minutes away from each other?

The issue of education, not only in China but all over the world, is extremely important to me. Having been able to experience these conditions firsthand has made me even more aware. I am extremely fortunate to have received the education I have been given and often feel that many children and young adults these days are taking their education for granted (I know I have at times) while those who wish they had the same opportunities aren’t able to get them. While many in the world do excel academically, millions are left behind in poverty.