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| Hugging
Grannies are Amity volunteers who provide extra love and care to the
children in the orphanages. They hold and feed
the babies, play with the toddlers, aid in physical and cognitive
development and help with medical needs. They also help the
orphanage staff by introducing and changing concepts concerning child
development and health.
In short, they work miracles every day of the week... |
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are retired teaching and medical personnel. For example, the first
four Grandma's at Jiujiang included a retired pediatrician, nurse,
special education teacher and a care giver. Read some letters
written to our Grannies...
The amount needed to support a Grandma varies between orphanages, partly depending on whether they are strictly volunteers or whether they are given some pay for their work. The volunteers are given a stipend for travel expenses and meals. The cost for each Grandma in Jiangxi province is US $544 a year and if you're specifically interested in this project you can make donations of any amount. We now have the following Amity Hugging Granny volunteers working in the orphanages listed below: Ganzhou has 5 Hugging Grannies. Guixi has 4 Hugging Grannies. Hengfeng has 1 Hugging Granny who is a doctor and works in the clinic. Ji'an has 4 Hugging Grannies. Jiujiang has 6 Hugging Grannies. Fuzhou (Linchuan) has 2 Hugging Grannies. Nanchang has 8 Hugging Grannies. Pingxiang has 1 Hugging Granny. Ruijin has 2 Hugging Grannies. Shangrao has 3 Hugging Grannies, 2 HG nurses and 1 HG tutor. Xinyu has 3 Hugging Grannies. Yichun has 3 Hugging Grannies. Yingtan has 3 Hugging Grannies. These and other volunteers bring our total to 53 Grannies, who need your support to cover their most basic needs, so that they can volunteer their time every day. |
Hugging Grannies at Nanchang recently donated 350 sets of new clothes for the children in the orphanage. Grandma Tang and Grandma Yu, who are working in the physically challenged toddler's room, have decorated the walls with many beautiful and interesting hand-works and pictures that they made themselves. |
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| They are helping the children's physical and mental development, as well as cognitive skills through singing and a variety of games. | ||
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Another two Grandmas
named Qiu and Zhang work very hard every day in the physically challenged
infant's rooms, trying to save the lives of severely ill
babies.
They give special attention to severely malnourished infants and toddlers. They even prepare and bring special food for the children from home. |
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In the photo on the right, you'll see Grandma Qiu in Nanchang taking care of a child named HW with cerebral palsy. Grandma Qiu started taking care of this child three months ago. At that time HW was so thin that his head looked enormous. People were calling him "Da Tou", which means big head. |
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He could not sit and was lying in bed all the time. But now he can sit by himself and hold toys with his right hand. If he feels happy, he will sing songs he created. |
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The staff members in the orphanages love the children, but resources are limited. Now that the Grannies are there, things are changing. Instead of being lined up against the wall sitting in their potty chair all day long they are up marching around the room and doing morning exercises. | |
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Actually these Grannies first had to teach many of the children to walk. Even though some are two or three years of age, they just hadn't had a chance to try before. And they're teaching the children new vocabulary words. They've presented an eight page teaching plan that they have written up. We can always use more Hugging Grannies! They allow us to help the largest number of children, using minimum resources. Currently, we're sponsoring 53 Hugging Grannies. We hope to raise funds to continue these sponsorships.
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