14th Mar

Today’s plan… A.M. visit Nguyen Dinh Chieu school

                   Arrange the schedule of research

Interview a massager

9:00@ Nguyen Dinh Chieu school

Today I visited Nguyen Dinh Chieu School. Because this is the only one school for the blind in Hanoi, many international agencies often visit here to support children. This school also provides many kinds of vocational trainings such as massage, music, IT etc. At first, I met the headmaster of this school to introduce myself and my research. Before coming here, I heard that many procedures and documents are required to carry our research in this school. But actually, it’s not as complicated as it seems.

In the music training room, I found the speakers. These are from Japanese government again. This item might be useful to practice musical instruments, but I think there are things that are more important for children. In rural provinces, many blind children cannot get a braille text to study. Moreover, in Vietnam, only 3-5 per cent of blind children can go to school. How can we help the people at the bottom?

This is the braille class. In this school, blind children receive inclusive education with sighted children. But before studying in the mainstream class, they need to study braille so that they can study by themselves.

Once they have started to study in the mainstream class, it seems to be hard to catch up with classmates. This is the math class. The teacher writing a calculating formula on the blackboard but a blind boy sitting the near side of this picture cannot see it.

The blankets on the side desk in the picture are for a daytime nap. Not only children but teachers have an afternoon nap after lunch. They sleep on the desk! This is one of the unique customs in Vietnam.

11:00@massage room

After visiting classrooms, I went to the massage room which is attached to this school to interview a massager. The girl I interviewed was blind only in one eye. But she couldn’t go to even primary school despite the mild disability. It is sad that most of people with disabilities in Vietnam don’t think they can go to school.