A Young Woman's Heart

This is probably why children's songs always use such soothing melodies.

"Little grass~ giggling~"

"Little grass—smiling happily—"

"Great! Cough! Everyone sang the lyrics correctly, that's great!" Hua Yinyin suppressed a laugh and gave a thumbs up. "Next, let's sing in a more synchronized way! Okay?"

"it is good--!"

"Okay, let's do it one more time, everyone sing along with me this time! Heavy rain, get ready—"

"The rain is pouring down..."

……

(Fives)

There are quite a few fifth-grade students; enough to form at least two teams for the competition.

Mr. Xue bit his whistle and blew it loudly, signaling the students who had just finished running to gather around him.

"Come over here, everyone!" he laughed heartily. "If you don't line up quickly, you'll have to stand in the sun for a while longer!"

The students, who had been scattered just moments before, immediately quickened their pace and lined up in an orderly fashion according to their height.

Mr. Xue waved his hand, signaling them to follow.

Although they had only run one lap around the playground, the students were already covered in sweat, and their clothes were soaked with sweat.

In the hot summer, it's always easier to sweat.

"Come on everyone! Sit down in the shade! Tell me if your bottom is hot! Let's play Drop the Handkerchief, everyone knows how to play, right?"

"meeting!"

"Do teachers play too?"

"Okay, I'll come too."

……

Chapter Twenty-Five: Class Teachers of All Classes

Assigning a homeroom teacher to each class would be too troublesome, since there are only sixty students in total.

Therefore, the homeroom teacher of all classes should originally be a real teacher.

However, Ye Wen took on the responsibilities of both the Dean of Students and the temporary principal, so Qiu Yi had to act as the gatekeeper to prevent any little brats from running away and having to search for them for ages.

As for Wang Qianyu... she and Taiyin were purely here on vacation. They weren't at school at all this morning; they went out to sea to fish with the local fishermen...

Therefore, this important task fell on Li Wanyan. Actually, Mr. Xue could also do it, but after thinking it over again and again, Ye Wen decided to entrust it to her. Perhaps it was because she trusted her more, or perhaps it was a training and test.

During the fourth period in the morning, children from all grades were gathered in one classroom—a classroom on the first floor, while the one next door was used as a temporary dining room for the summer vacation.

Sixty students filled the entire classroom, making it no longer as empty as the previous classes that were held separately, but rather quite crowded.

The desks used by the children are not all new. Some of the ones left over from the previous school were kept intact, some that could be repaired were repaired and put to use, and a small number of those that were not up to standard were replaced with new ones. Mixed among these old desks, you can see that the styles are obviously different.

"Dear students, although the largest age difference among you is five or six years, since not many students came to class during the summer vacation, we have gathered everyone together for this class meeting." Li Wanyan stood on the podium, calmly looking down at the students below.

Although her tone was gentle, a certain indescribable quality kept the large group of elementary school students sitting quietly, preventing them from causing a ruckus.

Children are very similar to animals, and perhaps their intuition tells them that the teacher standing on the podium is not someone to be trifled with.

—Otherwise, why doesn't she smile?

Just as the children were thinking this, Li Wanyan suddenly smiled and revealed a kind smile.

Many children hurriedly looked away, feeling that the teacher was even more terrifying when she smiled, like a villain in a TV series, always seeming to be plotting something horrific when she smiled.

The sunlight outside the window was particularly dazzling, and the students sitting by the window squinted, trying to hide to the side, but how could they hide?

Li Wanyan looked at a sixth-grade student and kindly instructed, "Gu Shengbin, go and draw the curtains on both sides and check if the electric fans are all turned on to the maximum."

"Oh!" The sixth-grade boy immediately stood up. He was quite big, tall and strong, obviously he ate very well.

"Although students in grades four, five, and six have already taken my classes, students in other grades haven't seen me yet." Li Wanyan stood ramrod straight on the platform, one hand, free of chalk, elegantly resting on her lower abdomen. She turned and wrote her surname on the blackboard, adding pinyin to accommodate the younger students. "My surname is Li. I will be your homeroom teacher for the time being this summer. If you don't pay attention in class or cause trouble, your subject teachers will inform me, and I will punish you according to the severity of your offense. Understand?"

For a moment, none of the students dared to answer, and the older and younger children looked at each other in bewilderment.

"Do you understand?" Li Wanyan smiled even more kindly, placing her hands on the podium, leaning slightly forward, and scanning the face of each student below the stage.

"understood!"

After a brief silence, several quick-witted individuals immediately shouted loudly, and seeing someone start, others followed suit, shouting in a haphazard manner.

"Yes, very good." She continued to smile. "From now on, the last period of every Saturday afternoon will be a class meeting. You should gather in this classroom on your own. This class is an exception; it will return to normal afterward."

"Now let's adjust the seating. Everyone, please stand up."

"Whoosh." Perhaps influenced by the atmosphere, these students, who were of very different ages and even greater heights, stood up in unison and looked up at Li Wanyan.

She nodded in satisfaction: "Everyone, go outside the classroom and wait. First-year students, stay behind."

"Wanyan is amazing..." Mo Xueyao, who was peeking from around the corner, shrank back. "She can actually make so many students behave."

"That's what presence is all about," Wang Jiale nodded and gestured with her lips. "The students are all out now, what's the class monitor going to do?"

"Should we adjust the seating? After all, there's such a big height difference. If they just sit anywhere, the shorter students won't be able to see anything in front of them."

"That's true... In elementary school, even a one-year age difference can result in a significant height difference..."

"Lele shouldn't be included, right?" Mo Xueyao teased in a low voice.

"What?! I was quite tall when I was in elementary school!"

"Oh, and it never grew again?"

"Hmph!" Wang Jiale stood on tiptoe as if in a huff, rested her chin on Mo Xueyao's head, and then rubbed it hard.

Inside the classroom, Li Wanyan arranged the first-grade students at the front, and then called in the second-grade students, and so on in order. Before long, the classroom was full of students again—but this time they were seated according to height, which made it look very neat.

She tidied up the documents on the podium. They were schedules that Duanmu Ji and the others had written in their spare time. Yes, because the school didn't even have a printer, they had to write them by hand.

The schedule includes different class schedules for each grade, as well as other time arrangements.

Li Wanyan personally distributed the copies one by one, and the students sat obediently with their hands on the table, as if they were attending a public lesson.

As she distributed the schedules, she said, "The class schedules for each grade are different, but the rest are the same. After you get them, check if the schedule is for your grade. If not, tell me. If you can't read, look at the pinyin. If you can't even read the pinyin, just listen to me and memorize it."

"Wake up at six in the morning, everyone assembles at six-twenty, jogs around the school, then eats in the classroom next door, and then it's free time until seven-thirty." As Li Wanyan handed out the schedule, her gaze would linger on the student in front of her, causing many to lower their heads in bewilderment. "At seven-thirty, everyone returns to their classrooms, where teachers will arrange morning reading. The first class officially begins at eight o'clock. If you don't know what class you're in, you can ask the teacher. A bell will ring at the start and end of each class—"

She skipped over the middle part of the timetable and continued, "After the fourth period in the morning, we all gather in the next classroom for lunch. We have lunch break until 1 p.m. We have classes from Monday to Saturday. On Friday and Saturday, we only have two periods, so we finish at 2:30 p.m.

These are mainly for older students, because younger students can't even read a clock yet and need teachers to guide and supervise them.

"For boarding students, those in grades four, five, and six must be in bed by 9 PM, and those in grades one, two, and three must have their lights out and be in bed by 8:30 PM. The dormitory supervisors will remind you of these, but it's recommended that you manage your time yourself." Li Wanyan had finished distributing the schedules and returned to the podium. "If boarding students want to go home on Sunday, they must inform the teacher in advance. If they don't want to go home, they can arrange their time freely on Sunday. Breakfast is from 7 AM to 8 AM, lunch is from 11 AM to 12:30 PM, and dinner is from 4 PM to 6 PM. If you don't know when there will be food, you can ask the teacher. The teachers are either in the office of room 301—remember, the office, not the classroom—or in the dormitory supervisor's room next to the stairs on the first floor of the dormitory building. Do you understand?"

The boarding students quickly nodded.

Li Wanyan licked her dry lips, feeling a little thirsty. She probably wouldn't talk this much all day...

“Other special circumstances will be announced. For example, today, school is over after this class. Students who don’t live on campus should come to school on Monday. Boarding students will go to the next classroom for lunch with the teacher later.” After saying this, she added, “Boarding students must be at school before 8:00 AM and show this schedule to your parents, grandparents, or other relatives…”

"Teacher..." a third-grade student timidly raised his hand, "My aunt takes care of me..."

"Whoever is in charge of you, just show this form to them, understand?"

"Understood!" He immediately straightened his back.

"Okay, all the teachers have assigned homework, right? Use the rest of the time to do your homework. If you don't understand something, you can raise your hand and ask me. Zhou Zhilan from sixth grade, come up here." Li Wanyan pushed her cheeks with her hand and forced out a smile as gentle as possible. "You still haven't memorized the various calculation formulas for polygons that you learned in fifth grade. Sit on the podium and recite them."

The girl, whose name was lovely but whose appearance was somewhat dull, dragged her 'heavy' steps onto the stage. She wasn't unattractive, but compared to her peers, she seemed a bit slower to react, which was evident in her facial expressions, making her look somewhat silly. "Teacher... I... I can't recite it..."

“If you can’t memorize it, just read it aloud first. You can stand next to me and read it.” Li Wanyan smiled in the gentlest tone possible. “It’s okay. If you can’t memorize it today, you can memorize it tomorrow. You’ll memorize it eventually.”

Zhou Zhilan scratched her hair into a mess, held the book to cover her face, and began to read aloud in a voice softer than a mosquito's buzz.

"Speak louder, don't be shy."

"The area of ​​the square is..." After being reminded, she only read half of the sentence aloud before her voice quickly faded away.

After repeating this process several times, it finally stabilized at a level that others could hear.

Amidst this agonizing silence, Qiu Yi's forceful ringing of the bell echoed from outside the classroom. The students, who had been quietly doing their homework, instantly looked up, their minds already wandering elsewhere.

—Class is over.

School's out.

……

Chapter Twenty-Six: Xuan An Yi's Children's Meal

It was a little after 2 p.m., just a few hours after lunch had ended, and Xuan Anyi was already rummaging through the kitchen for ingredients again.

Mo Xueyao, who had come to get water to boil, was pouring tap water into the kettle with a 'whoosh' sound: "Auntie, what are you looking for?"

"Preparing dinner." She turned her head and smiled, placing a large bag of flour on the stove.

"Didn't Awen say she wanted to set a menu?"

"She gave up."

"What?"

Xuan Anyi smiled and glanced at her before saying, "Because it's obviously more convenient to do whatever is available."

"Ah Wen is really lazy..." Mo Xueyao chuckled, placed the kettle full of water on the stove, bent down to the side and turned on the gas cylinder knob, and then turned the stove switch.

She couldn't find the electric kettle; all she found was this one that needed to be heated.

"Crack, tap tap tap—" A pleasant sound rang out, and the blue flames on the stove immediately began to burn.

What are you planning to eat tonight?

"I'm making something the kids like to eat today."

"Because there are so many ingredients?" Mo Xueyao asked, arms crossed and leaning against the door.