Kindergarten teachers change their careers from parenting to old-age care

2024-01-03 08:54

Source: Beijing Youth Daily

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Zhang Xia still remembers the fierce competition when he applied for the position of kindergarten teacher. She was lucky to succeed in one fell swoop. However, a year later, Zhang Xia chose to directly step from the "sunrise" industry of childcare to the "sunset" track of elderly care services.

This may be an accurate grasp of the market opportunities brought about by the aging trend.

Interestingly, after changing careers, some people found that there is actually a certain relationship between parenting and elderly care, from raising children to bringing "old children", they just transferred the same heavy love to another group of lovely people.

Changing careers in early childhood education

They gave up their short career as kindergarten teachers

"The children praise me for being beautiful every day, they will give me small gifts made by themselves, they will come to me every day when they enter the kindergarten, every time everyone calls me, the corridor is full of children's voices, at that moment, I am really happy!"

Zhang Xia recalled the time he worked in the kindergarten, and the most impressive thing was still the innocent smiling faces of the children, as well as the crisp and pleasant laughter.

At the beginning, more than 300 people competed for 8 places in Xianyang, Shaanxi Province, and the ratio was as high as 38:1. "Even if it's just a filing system, the competition is quite fierce. Zhang Xia said.

Now, a year after successfully landing, she has chosen to give up the job. It turned out that in Zhang's summer career as a kindergarten teacher, the monthly theme report, speech contest, and training took up almost all of his free time. At the same time, writing lesson plans, business notes, lecture notes, and open class discussions are also full of her daily routine.

Xiao Fan in Nantong, Jiangsu Province, has been in the industry for two years, and her feelings are similar to Zhang Xiaxia. What impressed Xiao Fan the most was those days when he worked overtime continuously because he needed to do environmental design.

This huge work pressure, coupled with a salary of only more than 3,000 yuan per month, made Zhang Xia and Xiaofan feel overwhelmed. Despite the children's innocence and loveliness, and the kindergarten is full of innocence, these goodness does not hide their exhaustion and frustration.

Seize the opportunity

After investigation and research, he turned to investment in pension

Mr. Yu from Jining, Shandong Province is an investor in a private kindergarten. From 2003 to 2003, when he invested in the establishment of the first kindergarten in the local area, he has witnessed the rapid development of private kindergartens from the beginning, to the current situation.

The epidemic has brought a lot of impact to private kindergartens. Mr. Yu said that the kindergarten he ran had been closed for more than a year. Moreover, due to the delay in resuming work, many faculty and staff have also taken the initiative to resign.

"A lot of our employees have been with us for 20 years, and if we don't transform, they may have a career hard in the future. In order to seek a glimmer of life and properly resettle the faculty and staff, Mr. Yu has gone through a lot of market research, visits, and inspections in the past year, and finally turned the next investment direction to home-based elderly care.

From preschool education to the field of elderly care, it seems to have a huge span, but in fact, this is an inevitable trend.

As of the end of 2022, there will be 280.04 million elderly people aged 60 and above, accounting for 19.8% of the total population, and 209.78 million elderly people aged 65 and above, accounting for 14.9% of the total population.

Mr. Yu believes that in the future, home care will be the choice of most people. That's why he started a senior care service center in the local community at the end of October last year.

He explained: "The cleaning aunts, maintenance masters and other logistics staff in the kindergarten can be directly transferred to the elderly care center, while the kindergarten teacher can be transferred to the store service. So far, 4 kindergarten teachers have successfully achieved the transformation. ”

Mr. Yu also added that the community club is now led by the former kindergarten teacher to carry out activities such as handicrafts and paper-cutting, and in the future, they will also receive skills training such as massage and massage to cope with future door-to-door services.

Transform the track

There are pension apartment recruitments directly marked to kindergarten teachers

Like Mr. Yu, Zhang Xia and Xiao Fan have also turned to the elderly care service track.

In the kindergarten where Xiao Fan worked before, nearly half of the teachers have changed careers. Today, some of them are engaged in live broadcasting, some are engaged in logistics, and some are engaged in adult education.

Xiao Fan feels that in comparison, she has the largest career change span. In April this year, Xiao Fan saw on the recruitment app that a nursing home that combines medical care and elderly care was recruiting social workers for the elderly. What caught her attention was the job description: "Roughly planning activities, organizing the elderly to participate, and playing with them." ”

Similarly, Zhang Xia remembers that the retirement apartment where she now works is directly marked "Kindergarten Teacher Recruitment" on the job posting. This aroused her great interest.

Later, she found that this pension apartment was only 5 minutes away from her home, and the monthly salary could reach more than 4,000 yuan. So, Zhang Xia did not hesitate to submit his resume.

On the day of the interview, she stepped into the apartment for the first time and was fascinated by its interior design: the corridors were adorably decorated with colorful decorations, with cartoon motifs such as apples and bananas on the door signs, and even playful Internet buzzwords such as "Princess, please come home", and there was even a crane machine in the event hall...... These are almost the same as kindergartens.

After successfully joining the company, Zhang Xia's current job responsibilities are mainly to take the elderly to sing, perform Orff musical instrument performances, do health exercises and other activities. In addition, she will also teach the elderly the most popular gesture dances, such as "Subject 3", which is popular all over the Internet. "I will change my tricks to play with the elderly, so that they can feel the new world outside. ”

There are more than 100 elderly people in the nursing institution where Xiao Fan is now, and it has been about a month before he has become familiar with the situation of each elderly person.

After more than half a year, she has a good understanding of the routine, Xi, and personality of the elderly in the institution. "Roughly classified, the old people have 'introverted players' and 'extroverted players', subdivided, some grandmothers are more tough, some love to be clean, some are keen to play cards, and some love to sleep......"

Get along with each other on a daily basis

Kindergarten work experience often comes in handy

In the process of getting along with the old people, Zhang Xia and Xiao Fan found that the liveliness of the old people was like a group of "old children".

In Xiao Fan's opinion, most of the grandparents are extremely friendly and funny. For example, there is an "i-person" grandfather who always silently watches every group activity, and will timidly ask Xiao Fan after everyone is finished: "Can I play now?" Xiao Fan is often amused by this grandfather who is a little "socially afraid".

On the other hand, in the big family of nursing institutions, the injection of young and new blood is a novelty for grandparents.

What made Xiao Fan laugh and cry was that it only took two or three days to take up the job, from his home address to his emotional state...... The old people have already asked her about her family background. Once, when Xiao Fan took three or four days off and came back to work, a grandmother asked her, "Where have you been these days? Have you gone home to get married?"

In the process of getting along with these old children, Xiao Fan found a set of methods. For example, when the enthusiasm of the elderly to participate in activities is not high, she will grasp the psychological characteristics of many elderly people who will "go to the queue because of an egg" and set prizes to "tempt" them.

When planning activities, Fan's previous work experience in kindergarten often comes in handy. For example, in the recent game of catching table tennis from paper cups, Xiao Fan once organized children to play.

It's just that the prize design has been adjusted, the children get small toys, pencils, etc., while Xiao Fan has prepared "practical" tissues, toothbrushes, and hand cream for the elderly......

For Zhang, more direct communication and contact with the "old children" took place in the music class. Ms. Zhang's classes are completely voluntary and participatory. At present, there are about twenty or thirty elderly people who come to class each time.

Sometimes, when the old man is late, they will even sincerely apologize to Zhang Xia: "Teacher, I'm late, I'm sorry." She was touched by the respect and cooperation. However, there are also naughty old people who will "make a little fuss" in class, and after being discovered by Zhang Xia, they will immediately sit upright.

Zhang Xia also found that the elderly prefer to reward stickers and stamps more than children, "some grandpas directly put stickers on the door of their heads, and some grandmothers did not get stickers, so they would ask me unhappily why they didn't praise her ......."

Recently, Zhang Xia also used music to help a grandmother with Alzheimer's disease.

At first, it didn't go well, and the grandmother never responded. After starting to play and sing, Zhang Xia has always tried her best to guide her grandmother to interact with her, "You look so good when you smile, grandma come, sing with me", she repeatedly persuaded with a happy expression and gentle tone, and finally let grandma dance with her hands......

After that day, Zhang Xia overheard a conversation between his grandmother and the caregiver. "She said she was so happy today, and I felt quite a sense of accomplishment at the time. Zhang Xia said that although the grandmother's Alzheimer's disease is still worsening and she can't even call her own name, she has slowly come to know Zhang Xia. "She now comes to music lessons every day and always says that she knows me so well, as if she has seen me somewhere. ”

Change and change

The service concept remains the same, and the working state and mood have changed

"Will there be a gap between the fragrant and tender children around us and us old people with wrinkled faces?" a grandmother asked Xiao Fan.

Xiao Fan admits that compared with when she was a kindergarten teacher, her current state and state of mind have indeed changed - it has become much easier.

This change is not an empty subjective feeling, but stems from her own experience working in a nursing home.

Working in a nursing home, Xiao Fan comes into contact with elderly people living alone in nearby neighborhoods, whose children often come to visit. They are able to understand the work of medical staff and social workers up close and intuitively, so that they can better understand and appreciate their work.

Xiao Fan said: "When family members see our work status, they will know that we have worked hard to organize activities, and some family members will take the initiative to help us." ”

After working in a nursing home for a long time, Xiao Fan feels like getting along with her grandparents, and she has become everyone's "baby".

Zhang Xia was also deeply touched, "I feel that in addition to being happy, I also have more tears than before." She said that whenever the meal is served, all the grandparents are staring at you, expecting you to come over to eat together, and will give you delicious food, and tears will roll in her eyes at that time, "Everyone's love goes both ways." ”

For Mr., after turning to the pension track, his biggest experience is that the original work concept has not changed from beginning to end. "We've been doing services, and in kindergartens, although we're serving children, our clients are actually parents. Today, we serve the elderly, but our customers are still the same people. In fact, Mr. Yu said, patience, carefulness and love when dealing with children are equally important when dealing with the elderly.

In third- and fourth-tier cities, community-based home-based elderly care is still an emerging business for most people. He is convinced: "We give each class of children in kindergarten three years of service. But once the pension industry is started, we can serve the elderly for 10 years, 15 years, or even longer. ”