CASE STORIES
APPENDICES
CASE STORIES
Story 1: Migrant Parent Worker – WeChat’ s indispensable role in communication and learning
Liu Fanghua, a 29-year-old factory employee and mother of a four-year-old son has come to learn about the importance of communication and accessing knowledge in her role as a responsible parent.
Since the past six years Fanghua has been working in the material inspection section of a factory in Chongqing, not too far from her hometown in Changzhou County. She works on morning and night shifts that rotate on a monthly basis, and has worked her way up to a managerial position. Although the pay is not as good as some of her previous jobs, she feels fortunate because it enables her to live with her son every second month. During the night shift, Fanghua stays in the factory dorm while her son is taken care of by his grandparents and father. Her husband is also tied up with work and rarely comes home early. As a result, her grandparents play an indispensable role in her son ' s upbringing.
“ I trust my parents when it comes to feeding my son and keeping him warm and sound, but I think there is huge difference when it comes to parenting styles as their style is seemingly outdated”, says Fanhua. The boy ' s grandparents always keep him inside instead of letting him play outdoors with other children, as they are afraid of him having an accident or sustaining unnecessary injuries“, she explains.“ I think this definitely affects his personality and development of social skills, so I take him out a lot to parks and friend gatherings whenever I get a chance”.
Fanghua ' s concerns are not uncommon – a gaping generational gap exists between many parents and their elderly parents, particularly vis-à-vis parenting and access to information.
Fanghua, like many, considers WeChat her favorite app. She spends most of her free time browsing " Moments " for updates from her friends, reading articles on parenting and child education from several WeChat public accounts and video chatting with families and friends.
During a CCR CSR face-to-face parenting training session in her factory in July 2015, Fanghua learned about the WeSupport eLearning platform on WeChat and started using it.“ I learnt so many useful tips about remote parenting and communication in that session that I scanned the CCR CSR’ s WeChat QR code as soon as I knew that more e-courses and weekly posts are available on that platform” Fanghua said in the interview.
Since Fanghua only returns home every second month, WeChat has become an important tool in maintaining frequent contact with her son. She uses the video chat function twice a week to communicate with him. Lessons like“ Effective long distance communication” and“ How to make most use of gathering time” on the WeSupport eLearning platform have given her practical guidance on remote parenting, dealing with hard situations and building trust with her child.
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