Chapter 5 5. Study in a girls' school

Robbie Eunsen described their family in the book "The Three Soong Sisters": "Although the family is full of joy, it is a cultivated family, and the children are educated to cultivate a sense of responsibility from an early age. .It's a very well-behaved family again." Song Jiashu and his wife's ideology and morality and good family education methods have an extremely important influence on the three sisters. Mother Ni Guizhen is a Spartan woman.According to Song Meiling's later words, "Mother's personality shows her sternness and strength everywhere, but she is definitely not soft and sentimental." This mother led the children to pray almost when they were still in their infancy.These formed Soong Meiling's kindness and perseverance in doing things and doing things later.

Mothers have a great influence on their children, and fathers are no exception. In Song Jiashu's view, the most advanced, scientific and greatest education method should be the education method that conforms to the nature of children, that is, their individuality. Any action that strangles or suffocates children's nature is stupid and sinful. Song Jiashu said to people more than once: "As long as one of the 100 children becomes a superman-like great talent, there will be 4 million supermen in China. I am afraid that they will not be saved. Now most families in China cannot wholeheartedly raise their children. I must dare to serve the world. First."

Song Jiashu and his wife Ni Guizhen formulated a modern "Spartan-Christian" education model: in the process of fully developing children's beautiful nature, train them to become Spartan warriors with Christian spirit. As early as 1898, Song Jiashu and his eldest daughter Song Ailing compiled a "Shanghai Children's News", and the main articles were written by the children themselves.In this free world, children can fully imagine and write what they want to write.Song Jiashu is just their friend, printer and loyal reader.And certainly their most ardent critic. Children are free to display their talents in this small world.

This newspaper was published until their two youngest children, Ziliang and Zian, entered middle school. In this family, English has become the first choice for the children.Song Jiashu said: "Learning English is to open your eyes to see the world, and to improve your knowledge and skills in future studies." He is not against learning Chinese.He said: "To serve the motherland in the future, the Chinese must be good." He firmly believes that future Chinese leaders must learn both Chinese and Western. The school where the three sisters of the Song family attended their enlightenment was Shanghai Sanyitang Girls' School.

At that time, influential Chinese in Shanghai thought that the teachers in Chinese and Western girls' schools were superior, so they sent their daughters to Chinese and Western girls' schools instead of Sany girls' schools.However, Song Jiashu believes that the Chinese and Western Girls' School is just the window of the Chinese Diocese of the American Board of Supervisors. It is controlled by Lin Lezhi and has brought bad things from American society into Shanghai. It was named after Bishop Mackina who studied medicine in the United States.Song Jiashu thought that sending his own child to this kind of school would be emotionally and intellectually unacceptable to him.Therefore, he sent his daughter to the Sanyitang Girls' School with Miss Jin Hansheng as the principal.

Sanyitang Girls' School is located on the side of the Eight Immortals Bridge in Shanghai, not far from the Song family. The principal Jin Hansheng claimed that the teachers of Sanyitang Girls' School are no worse than Chinese and Western Girls' Schools. In the autumn of 1898, Song Ailing entered the Sanyitang Girls' School.At that time, because of the inconvenient transportation, it took a long distance from Song's home to the school.The clever Ai Ling found a shortcut, which can go directly to the school through the church on Gilber Road.The following year, Qing Ling was also sent to Sanyong Girls' School to study.

When Xiao Meiling saw that her two older sisters had gone to girls' schools, she lost her playmates at home, and seeing how her two older sisters looked after school, she also clamored to go to school. Song Jiashu looked at her younger daughter's attitude of not giving up until she reached her goal, and felt that Ai Ling also went to school at the age of 5, and she was her role model.Besides, Qingling is also at school, and has two older sisters to take care of her, so there shouldn't be any problems.Just when Meiling was just 5 years old, the three sisters became students of the same school.

Another important reason for Song Jiashu's determination to send Meiling to school is that education should be social. No matter how good family education is, it cannot replace the training of collective life.When children grow up, they always have to go to society and face various challenges in society independently.In his opinion, they should not be princesses in an ivory tower, let alone canaries in a cage, they should be wavers. Meiling's wish to go to school finally came true. Xiao Meiling was ecstatic. This is the first time she's actually been away from home. The family gave her a shallow box.It was a beautiful, shiny black box, and it was the first box she had ever used for herself.

She happily cleaned out her own laundry and chose her must-haves: nice dresses, trousers, cute knick-knacks, and the obligatory chocolate candies and a small box of toffees... However, when she put all these things in, the box was not yet full. She frowned and looked around the small room... She decided to pack the cotton-padded clothes and trousers into the small suitcase. After doing all of this, she looked around the familiar little world again. "God, I'm leaving here, I'm going on a long journey, goodbye..." At this time, she felt uncomfortable, nervous, and even a little scared.She felt tears were coming.

"Now you can still change your mind, whether to go to school or stay at home?" Her father saw her mind and kindly asked her to decide for herself. Xiao Meiling tilted her head and replied firmly, "Go to school." Still, the throat was full of chokes. After everything was ready, Song Jiashu picked up the box and walked out of the house with his little daughter. On this day, Xiao Meiling was dressed neatly.Wearing a pair of green trousers and a plaid jacket, she clings to her father and sets out for the great world. When Miss Richardson, the principal, saw Song Jiashu and his daughter with pigtails in her office, she felt curious and amused.He said seriously in English: "Do you really want to go to school?"

Meiling held her head up stubbornly, and blurted out an answer in English: "I think going to school is better than everything else!" Miss Richardson was taken aback, and said to Song Jiashu, "This little girl can talk in English?" Song Jiashu said: "It's nothing, I teach my children to speak English when they just learn to speak." Miss Richardson said: "However, she is still a little younger. It's okay, let her try it out as a boarding student first." ... When she broke up with her father, the emotional gate of Xiao Meiling's young heart suddenly opened.She jumped up in one step, hugged her father's neck tightly, and cried sadly.It seemed that she had been sold into slavery. Miss Richardson hugged Xiao Meiling affectionately, comforted her, and let her calm down slowly. The desk and chairs were too high, and Soong Meiling couldn't touch the ground when sitting on the chairs. After a class, she always lost feeling in her legs.Only when she was in Chinese class, because she repeatedly recited vocabulary with an appropriate rhythm, and her legs swung back and forth with the rhythm, could the blood flow in her legs, and she didn't feel numb and uncomfortable. She has endurance since she was a child. Miss Richardson was particularly fond of Meiling.Especially when I saw her serious look in class, I remembered an old folk song, expressing my love for Xiao Meiling: "There is a little girl with a bunch of curly hair, which happens to be in the middle of her head." "Who is the little girl?!" "Of course it is me!" Xiao Meiling always answers in English. Trinity School for Girls is a church school.Church schools have a strict management system, which is piety to God.However, the school's education is very humane, and it pays great attention to cultivating the emotions and talents of the students in the form of drama. Once, Song Meiling played the role of queen. On the day of the performance, almost all the parents came.Song Jiashu naturally became an enthusiastic audience of this performance.In order to watch his daughter's performance, he put aside all the important things of the day. The play is spoken in English. The young actors are very involved.Although they searched around with their small eyes from time to time, looking for their relatives. The play went on smoothly, with ups and downs and a climax. The prince put the crown on Meiling's head, and the "prince" said: "I will crown the queen." There was warm applause from the audience. At this time, the parent of another child, who is also a good friend of Song Jiashu, jumped onto the stage and shouted: "Aha, in this way, Mr. Song will become the queen's father and the king's father-in-law!" The audience is boiling. People turned to Song Jiashu and laughed. Song Jiashu laughed more than anyone else.He also jumped onto the stage, picked up Soong Meiling wearing the crown, and happily threw her into the air. The carnival people threw cluster after cluster of flowers. For the first time, 6-year-old Xiao Meiling made a big splash in front of everyone. Her life began in Trinity Girls' School.