In 1982, that was my first year of residency. I worked at the pediatric unit in the city's hospital in Nanyang, Henan province, P. R. China. I was newly married to my classmate from medical school.
For helping the nursing shortage of the hospital, the hospital decided to set up a nursing program training the nurse assistants in the hospital to become nurses. The program was well welcomed since it was not only provides more nurses for the hospital but also help the nurse assistants get better future. Even though the program is mainly for the nursing assistances within the hospital, but other hospitals could support it and get some of their nurse assistants enrolled. Therefor we do have some people from outside of the hospital in the class.
It was the first time the hospital running this program. All the teachers were from the hospital, they basically are medical directors from every department in the hospital. The director of pediatric was Dr. Shan who was teaching the pediatric nursing.
Unfortunately, during the course, He had SVT, so he was admitted to the cardiac floor for treatment. He had to stop working and teaching. The class needs a substitute teacher. He talked about it at a morning meeting before rounding, and asked if any of us want to teach. He first asked a couple of senior pediatricians, since we were not a teaching hospital, no one wanted to teach in front of a group students. They were all fine taking followers. And then he said, if no one can teach, he had to ask someone from other hospital to come to teach. And at the last, he asked me. For me, I did not really want to take the job because I was always afraid of speaking in public. But I could not bear the idea that we have to get a teacher from other hospital. So, I said "yes."
Talking in public is not my specialty. In fact, when I had to talk in public, I got nervous, short of breath, and my mind went blind. Even though I was student leader since high school, but I tried to avoid any public speaking and was very successful. I would write the scripts for speaking and others would read the script when there were needs in high school. I was doing well on writing and calligraphy, so I did lots of writing as a student leader in high school by writing articles for blackboard newspaper and wall newspaper. In September 1976, after Chairman Mao passed, people all around China were making sure to let Chinaman Mao knew our firm resolution for the country. I did the writing and refused to speak In front of crowd. The other student leader read my script and made my passionate writing seem dry. In college, I again was selected as a student leader. I avoided all the talking since there was another leader who really liked to talk. One time I had to make an announcement, I went to the front and wrote the announcement on the blackboard.
So, taking the job as a teacher for the nursing program was a real challenge for me. I took it as a pride. But it took lots of work for me to overcome the fear of public speaking.
I spent lot of time to prepare my class.
At first, I read the pediatric internal medicine, sometimes on certain topic, I even read the surgical textbook and pathophysiology and write down everything I was going to teach in the class and drawn all the diagrammatic presentations on a big paper to show in the class.
And then, I would try to memorize everything I wrote.
And the third, I would give the lecture to my husband and took his critics, correction and suggestions since he works in the teaching hospital and already teach surgery in the local medical school.
And the last, I would record my lecture at home and listen to it and make corrections.
Despite all the preparation, at my first class, I was not able to look at the classroom full of students when I started my lecture. I looked at the window instead. Because of the thorough preparation, I was doing ok. It took me about 15 minutes; I was fine and able to look at the students. And for the subsequent class, I became the students' favorite teacher! The result was the hospital wanted me to teach the pediatric nursing for the following program!
After students from the first nursing program graduates, the hospital started the second nursing program. I saved my preparation book and overcame my social anxiety which made it easier for the teaching later on. I did not have enough time to prepare for the class later since I had my son at that time and also working at the clinic. I took my old class preparation notebook at the clinic and read it when there was a downtime.
I taught two terms of pediatric nursing in the hospital. I have met some interesting students.
On my first class, there was a student from woman and children's hospital whose name is Xia Wang. Her dad and my dad were all in the army, and we used to live and grown up in the same family compound of the armed forces department. She was elder than me and I used to play with her little sister and later became classmates in elementary school. I used to see Xia as older and wise and admire her a lot. Xia later joined the army herself and left the retired from the army few years later. And she was in my class and I was teaching her! It was amazing seeing her as my student!
On my second term of teaching, there was a student from a factory hospital whose name is Shuting Xia. She went to middle school with me but in the different class. She was tall and beautiful and came from a family working in a factory. I left that school just after she was admitted to the school, so she did not really know me. But she was new, so I do remember her. Now she is my student as well!
Teaching a class really helped me to overcome my social anxiety and also helped me to better understand the text and pathophysiology. Truly, teaching benefits teachers as well as students.
After that, the classmates from my medical school organized a small reunion in our home and planned to ride our bakes out to the countryside to see our classmates there. I talked a lot and made my old classmates were surprised. They asked what I do at work. I told them that besides working as a pediatrician in the hospital and clinic, I also teach nursing program. They said: 'that is why! Good for you?" They saw the change of me.
After all, that was a good experience. I enjoyed it and loved it! Thanks to Dr. Shan for the opportunity!
And the teaching was free as I remember. My salary was ￥46.00 per month at that time.
