Phally Pheng likes getting kids’ hands up in the air. A former sponsored child who now teaches in northeast Cambodia, she works hard to teach in ways that engage her students. She wants her students to participate — for their hands to spring up in excitement when she asks a question.
Imagine this: It is a cold winter night. You are five years old, hungry and huddled under an apartment stairway. You are unprotected from the wind and snow, and unprotected from the drunkards around you. You sit in a corner, shivering and crying for fear that you might be attacked.Most adults would be intimidated, let alone a child.Yet, Burenkhaan Erdenechimeg had to live through that as a young five-year-old Mongolian boy. Not only would he and his mother collect glasses and cans to survive, he eventually lost his mother on the streets.
8-year-old Xiaohua lives with his parents and 3-year-old younger brother in the deep mountains of Yongsheng county, Yunnan province. Xiaohua’s father does part-time jobs in places near the village, while his mother works in the fields and takes care of the family. In spit of this, life has always been difficult. They can barely make ends meet.