Sinuiju Municipal Ponbu Kindergarten is situated in the centre of the border city of Sinuiju on the lower Amnok River.
It is not so large a kindergarten with a three-storey building, but it has produced lots of child prodigies.
Not long ago I visited the kindergarten for news coverage.
It was surrounded by a row of armful-thick willow trees whose budding branches were swinging in a warm spring wind. Spectacular were its sunflower-patterned fence, a roller-skating rink in the compound and the style of the building similar to a baby’s rattle. I found myself becoming a child again at the first sight of the kindergarten.
Merited Teacher Kang Sun Hui, director of the kindergarten, welcomed me. Kang had been introduced across the country through TV for her having trained many little prodigies. Among the prodigies was Ku Tae Hong who was introduced by
Korea Today
as a little calligrapher for his having written well the title of the mass gymnastics and artistic performance Arirang, a
Kim Il Sung
Prize winner.
When I told her I was there to collect news materials on the pride of the kindergarten in producing a lot of child prodigies, the director said with an awkward smile, “Your words sound excessive. We have done what we have to do. Our duty is to cultivate the future of our country. We’ve always kept it in mind while working.” She then explained about the principle for their work as follows: They fully grasp and study the characters, mentalities and tastes of children when they are in the junior class, and give them early artistic education in the senior class.
I was guided to the room of senior class No. 3 first, where the children were practising in writing with a brush. Though at a young age when they would otherwise play on their mothers’ affections, the children were writing letters admirably maintaining the balance between strokes and dots and between blanks and margins on the basis of formative analysis of the structure. I also saw calligraphic works
We Are the Happiest in the World
and
Flower Buds Bloom Only Red
by Jon Chol Jin and Hyon Tae Ung. The works enabled me to read their laudable determination to develop into noted calligraphers of the country.
On the first floor the director guided me to the room of senior class No. 4 where the children were practising in drawing pictures. They were using colour pencils to draw pictures reflecting their hopes and dreams. Their teacher Choe Chun Hui said, “It is not an easy job to have an understanding of the child’s mind and develop their aptitudes and intelligence.” And she told me the following story about Kim Su Yong, a little “artist.”
In her infancy Su Yong was unusually clever and good at singing and sight reading. So her parents intended to have her learn how to play the kayagum or xylophone. But the teacher judged that drawing was more appropriate for the child who had good powers of observation and imagination.
So she taught her the knack of drawing. Several months after she began to learn drawing Su Yong distinguished herself by presenting a good picture at a national kindergarten children’s talent contest to the amazement of the participants and experts.
The teacher told me that it was more difficult to find out a bud of success than to succeed.
Appreciating her words, I went upstairs. On the floor I heard sight reading, sound detection and sounds of national musical instruments. I also saw the photos of child master flutist Ri Jin U, Kye Thae Hun who won a special prize by playing
jangsaenap
(a Korean trumpet) and a bass drum well on the stage for a kindergarten children’s general performance held in Pyongyang in September last year and those who had remarkably performed the folk play
Rope Jumping
at the aforesaid mass gymnastics and artistic performance, deeply impressing the Korean people and foreigners from across the world.
While looking round the kindergarten I could not help but be struck with admiration at the children’s talent and the teachers’ faithful efforts dedicated to the development of their talent. The director said, “Every year our kindergarten produces many children of talent. We trained such children as little poetess Kim Il Sin and master hourglass drummers Kim Chol and Nam Se Yong. That’s why people affectionately refer to ours as kindergarten of talent, and it is visited by not only our people but also foreign delegations and inspection groups. They number as many as hundreds of thousands. All foreign visitors to the kindergarten say they have seen the future of Korea in the children playing and singing happily.”
They are right. It was one of ordinary kindergartens, and I could fairly see the future of the country in the children of talent. When I left the kindergarten, what Merited Teacher Pak Myon Suk said patting Thae Hun on the lovely cheeks—“You smile brightly and bloom into a good man!”
Kim Son Myong
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《Korea Ryugilo Editorial Bureau》