A different teacher! Educational staff, social workers and therapists from the social welfare sector help people with mental disabilities turn their lives around

Tomorrow (28th) is Teacher's Day. Most people think that teachers teach in schools. However, there are a group of people in the social welfare sector who do not have teacher certificates and are also involved in teaching work, including teaching talking, teaching walking, and teaching self-care. However, the value of their work has long been underestimated. The First Social Welfare Foundation pointed out that education workers, social workers, and therapists perform their duties on the front line. This group of different teachers gives children with mental disabilities a chance to turn their lives around, and they also deserve to be paid tribute on Teachers' Day.

First Social Welfare stated that Wu Yixi, an education worker, studied physical education and special education in college and often went to institutions for internships. He felt that it was easy to get along with people with mental disabilities. In 2012, he joined the First Social Welfare Private Zhonghe Development Center as an education worker. Although He once left the banking industry for 10 months but still returned. He frankly said that working as an education worker is challenging, especially when meeting people with emotional problems. He has to put himself next to him and the service users in the middle. But seeing their smiles makes him happy, which is why he persists to this day.

Music teacher Li Xiaowen studied music-assisted therapy abroad. After returning to China and entering the Yongai Development Center of the First Social Welfare Development Center, she tried hard to start music-assisted therapy activities. She said that most people think that music-assisted therapy means listening to music and playing instruments, but this is not the case. For example, during the Mid-Autumn Festival, the theme of the course will be to take the service users to peel grapefruits with relevant music playing, so that they can have multiple sensory stimulations of hearing, smell and touch. Many people know that taking music classes will be particularly happy and give them a sense of accomplishment.

Occupational therapist Wu Chenxin came to First Social Welfare in 2017. She likes to interact with children. She has been serving early childhood care children at the First Child Development Center for a long time. First Early Childhood Care provides team assessment and support by education staff, social workers, and therapists. This working model allows her to have a better understanding of the conditions of early childhood care children. Every time she sees early childhood care children slowly walking due to the service, and then growing up to be separated from her hands, and living a smoother life after being transferred, she is happy and proud of this job of helping children turn their lives around.

First Social Welfare CEO Zhang Jinglun said that First Social Welfare has long been committed to the education, care and support services for people with mental disabilities, and has served more than hundreds of thousands of people over the past 47 years. Team members include education workers, social workers, and therapists, each of whom performs their own duties. For many families, these different teachers bring hope to their children's lives and help them shoulder the burden of care. They are a group of people worthy of being honored on Teacher's Day.