LANZHOU, June 1 (Xinhua) -- The scene is just like any other dancing classes. Lines of children swing their bodies in time to the music and imitate the gestures of the teacher in front of them. But all of these students are are deaf, and wearing artificial cochleas.
The class takes place in the hearing-speech rehabilitation center in northwest China's Gansu Province. The center combines treatment and rehabilitation, including individual instruction and speech therapy.
Friday is International Children's Day.
"Children who are unable to speak or hear should be in rehabilitation as soon as possible," says Zhang Jiaru, the dance teacher, who also teaches fine arts.
Born in Minqin County, Wuwei City, Zhang, 24, has hearing issues herself and wears an audiphone. When she was young, her parents took her for treatment several times to the provincial capital Lanzhou and Beijing.
"When I was three years old, a Beijing doctor concluded that I would not hear anything except when a helicopter landed near me," she says.
After years of rehabilitation in the center and other institutions, Zhang was able to live a normal life and went to art college. She has been working in the center since graduation in 2016.
"These children just remind me of myself," she says. "I hope art and dance can nourish the kids and help them fit into society."
Since it opened its doors in 1989, the center has trained more than 4,000 hearing-impaired children, nearly 20 percent of whom went on to ordinary primary and high schools and even colleges.
At the center, each kid under seven years old is granted 88,500 yuan (13,800 U.S. dollars) of financial aid from the central government for artificial cochleas, implant surgery and rehabilitation training.
The center also has a kindergarten, where disabled children are taught in mainstream classes.
An artificial cochlea program for impoverished deaf children was given 2.3 billion yuan from 2009 to 2016, with 20,000 children receiving free implants and rehabilitation.
A regulation released last year established a system to aid disabled children with free surgery and assistive devices, and rehabilitation training for children under-six with sight, hearing, speech, limb or learning problems.
Watching her daughter dance through a window, Wang Congyan, 27, feels comforted.
After a year and a half at the center, her five-year-old is able to hear as well as to speak. She also goes to a kindergarten together with children who have no hearing difficulties.
"I hope she becomes more confident, and lives and studies just like any kid," Wang says.
