Muli Shawni all! Well here it comes, the post I promised earlier bragging about my ever so wonderful students! If I talked about the whole week I would be writing just way too much, so let’s just focus on Thursday and Friday.
I don’t believe I told many of you, but this past month two business students from Stanford University, Claudine and David, were working with Spark and Hope to kinda track Hope’s progress and help them out on the whole business front of their organization. It was great working with these two, and it already feels emptier at the office without them.
ANYWAYS, since Thursday would be one of their last days, they offered to come to school to read with Stacey and my students. My students love books. I bring a few stacks in every day that they can pull from if they finish their work early, or if we have a few free minutes before lunch or break. Now many cannot understand what they are reading, and some can’t even tell what word they are looking at, but they don’t care. It is just such a commodity to have a bright, clean, colorful book in their hands and once they pick it up its quite hard to get them to put it back down so lessons can continue. Hehe. This being said, I was understandably stoked to have two extra resources in Claudine and David at hand for reading. Teacher Judy and I split our class into four groups according to skill level, and I then pulled a few books for each group that would be up to par, if not a little challenging. I then placed each adult with a group, taking the students that struggle the most for myself. Not gonna lie, I was not so sure as to how this whole reading thing would play out, but I can say for myself it was extremely fulfilling. Yes, many students in my group struggled with any word more difficult than “the”, “that”, or “and”. Yes, a few were only able to repeat a sentence after I read it. Yes, there were some very frustrating moments in that hour, but looking back it still only makes me smile. Can you imagine, one student reading a few lines out of a story book while eight others eagerly crowd around trying to see and sound out words as well, waiting not so patiently for their turn to come? Precious. Towards the end of the hour, after struggling through two stories, I was making my way towards closing the afternoon when I heard dear Elizabeth’s voice pipe up over the noise of children reading. “Teacher Sara, can we read one more book?” Why of course Elizabeth, I would love to read one more book with you. I mean, really, how could I deny her? This is a girl who basically refuses to read out loud in class, often looks disinterested, and giggles at me if I try to ask her a question so to have her ASK for more work blew my mind.
I thought Thursday couldn’t get any better, but of course I was wrong again. That evening at Hope House they had a closing meal for Claudine and David, and Stacey and I were lucky enough to attend as well. The power in all of Ndola blew for a few hours, so the evening started in candle light. You might think this would just be horrible, but it was actually quite beautiful. The kids from the orphanage belted out songs in the dark, and I think Ba Charles was quite right in stating it was good the lights were out so we didn’t have to see one another’s tears (though for once I wasn’t the one crying!). Thankfully the power turned back on during dinner so Stacey and I could challenge the girls from Hope to an EXTREME game of Twister. You know Twister…”left hand red, right foot blue”. Pretty calm, yes? Not the way we were playing. Hehe. There was some serious pushing, tickling, and even a little butt smacking going on in our game. We were laughing so hard at one point I couldn’t move, let alone breath. These going away dinners, while so much fun, are already making me dread the day my turn comes around. Is it too late to change my mind and stay an extra few months?
I think I’ll not talk about the craziness of showing up to work on Friday to find most of the teachers gone and therefore just jumping into the seventh grade classroom and teaching them from scratch. Yeah, it was kinda rough. Stacey and I that day also had the genius idea of combining our two
classrooms (which turned into three classrooms since I had 7th grade as well) in the afternoon for a little gym time relay racing. It was a hot, loud, fun mess. We had them running, wheelbarrow racing, skipping, hopping, and my favorite….cart wheeling. I forgot how much fun gym time is. I think I look forward to Friday afternoons more than my students!
Well this week just started, so I guess the bragging can stop there. Presidential elections are tomorrow so there is no school as President Banda declared it a holiday. I don’t really expect trouble, but prayer for peace in Zambia during this hyped up time would still be much appreciated.
Loves!
Sara
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