First day of class

I (Marsha) am teaching two classes, management and statistics. While I was told I would be teaching six days a week, it turns out that I am teaching 2 days a week, for three hours each class. We are living in Foreign Expert Building on the Dongfeng campus. But we are teaching on the Longdong campus. There are five campuses for this University.
The management class is on Tuesday night (6:15 – 8:50 pm) with a half hour ride by shuttle bus to home. Unfortunately, to arrive in time for class, I have to take the only bus that stops at 5 schools, thus taking a full hour. All other rides will be a half hour. The statistics class is during the afternoon from 2:15 – 5:00 pm. There are two scheduled breaks for about 5 minutes each. A bell rings to let you know when to take the break. This is quite different from GSU where I usually give 1 break of about 15 minutes when we finish a segment.
Yu-Mi, one of my students, came to the apartment to show me the way to school. She lives at the Longdong campus where I am teaching. We had an hour on the bus to talk. She pointed out several other universities along the route. Guangzhou is a very large city with many universities. She had many questions about Governors State University and Chicago.
There were 12 students in the class. There are supposed to be three additional students who are faculty but they had a meeting that evening, so they did not come. The students are very receptive. In fact one of the students asked me to give written assignments with presentations. He heard that it was customary at foreign schools to have assignments including reports and presentations. And he wants the experience. I don’t think the other students are quite as ambitious.
Previously I was told not to give homework because they are already taking a full schedule and not to give exams. However, Professor Yi who is in charge of the program wants me to give an exam so that they will experience an American style exam. Next week is their final exams, and then they will have more time. However, they still have to write the final thesis of their four year program so I don’t know how much work I should give them. This course is not for credit.
This first night, I told them a little of my background and then asked for theirs. About ¼ of them are majoring in International Trade and Economics. We have one English major in the class, one majoring in Chemical Engineering, several in Accounting and Finance. While I have been told that they are timid and would be hesitant about talking in class, they seemed to like the chance to participate. Many of them are soft spoken, but I think they just are not as comfortable speaking in English. Similar to my many classes through out the years, some students are more willing to participate then others. I don’t see a difference. I will try to encourage all to participate.
I took everyone’s picture with their name on the blackboard. Hopefully this will help me learn their names faster. I had those who did not already have English names choose them. I will ask them if it is OK to post their pictures on my album of China. If it is OK, then I will post them in a couple of days.
Tomorrow I teach Statistics. It will be the same students, but in the afternoon.