Teacher Blog

January charity update

As charity organiser for Apollo HCMC what have I been doing.....?

Christmas is the time of loving and giving. So...we sold over 50 packs of Christmas and Tet cards hand painted by disadvantaged children from Thang Long vocational school - Saigon Children's Charity School in district 4 HCMC. The cards are sold in packs of 6 designs for 80000VND and all the money we raised helps bring educational opportunities and a brighter future to local diasadvantaged children. Tet cards are still available for purchase in reception.

The teachers donated money to buy toys, and the parents were asked to bring in any unused toys. We managed to build a big pile...and every toy or book counts to a disadvantaged child.

It was a real pleasure to visit an inclusive school for hearing impaired kids in HCMC with Rusty (a fellow teacher at Apollo) and Miss Chinh (from SCC). The children feel included with the others and their speaking improves. Teachers here also receive special training. The majority of children with hearing issues don't have this opportunity. Instead they stay home or attend special schools.

We had lots of fun playing with the kids and they even sang a song for us! They loved the toys.

Next we visited an SCC orphans shelter in HCMC. Children here have a mixture of disabilities and range from 2 to 22 years old. it costs up to 60 million VND per month to run a shelter for only 20 children, and the majority of this money is spent on medicine. The children loved the toys and Rusty played a very serious chess game against two of the children...

We also set up an Apollo Sibling Scheme. This means that teachers can adopt a little brother or sister, build a real relationship, and spend an hour a week hanging out and having fun. It's great to really get to know one of the kids introduced to us by Saigon Children's Charity. Here is a photo of Dana with her little sister...

The majority of our work has been in collaboration with Saigon Children's Charity as it reaches out to children with many different needs. We are also supporting an independant HIV shelter in Binh Thanh, HCMC. The children live, play, and learn in one house and it is very cramped. We are helping to provide teaching materials, lesson plans, and craft ideas to their English teacher, who has no previous teaching experience or training.

Here you can see the teachers working to build a syllabus for the HIV shelter..

.

 So thanks for reading and please get in touch if you have any charity ideas. You can contact me on charity@apolloedutrain.org