Tuesday, February 22, 2011

INITIATIVE!


We were studying Thermal energy and
made posters for people moving to Russia
(our mission's week country)
to know what they should wear, live in, etc.

        Initiative. A big word for elementary students, but it can be incredibly powerful. Initiative is our word of the month to focus on and the topic of our weekly chapels. We have discussed initiative through bible stories, games and many other activities. It has been wonderful to watch our students strive to reach out to new students, quickly offer to help and go above and beyond in other ways! They truly seem to be taking this challenge to heart, and I pray that they continue to strive to have initiative for Christ.




Burning the paper experiment!

        Conductivity and the miracles and beauty of God’s world around us has been a topic for us for the last week! We had a blast showing how a piece of paper held flat over a candle will burn a hole in the paper. But a coin on the paper in the middle, held over the candle doesn’t even get the paper very warm as the thermal energy is pulled to the coin! God truly has planned this world down to the last detail and it is incredible! Go ahead try the experiment (Carefully!!!)

Prayer Requests:

- Please pray that students will continue to be challenge to have initiative for Christ.
- Please pray for the chapel this week as I will be the one to share and I hoping that the story of Jim Elliot will reach deep into their heart and motivate to further serve the Lord. (For, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose.” – Jim Elliot)
- For my new students that are still working to fit in and catch up with all of their work and academics.
Insulators in houses is a novelty here for many of my students!
So before the made this Russia Poster, be had to do some exploring!
P.S. They think snow days are crazy and that we should get hot days when it goes
 over 100 with humidity close to 110+!

Firsts:
- First time almost getting knocked off a moving bus! On these buses you need to quickly jump on and they often immediately start driving away as you work to pay and move further onto the bus. Well after our regular shopping trip on Saturday morning, it was especially hot and with all of our groceries we decided to take a bus the 10 blocks instead of walking it. As we hailed the bus to stop, we quickly jumped on and it began to drive away. My friend jumped on the bus before me and was working to pay and get her change. As she received her change she turned to get through the turning bars to enter the bus. As she did, one of her largest bag full of fruit slapped me in the face and almost knocked me off the moving bus! Thankfully I had balanced my bags and was able to hold on and pull myself back on to the bus!
Practicing Mean, Median, and Mode
with Miss Weber's mini decks of cards!


- First time not having to pay for the bus ride. On this same bus ride as above… (which I was the only one aware of nearly being pushed off the bus) I had just pulled myself fully onto the bus again and proceeded to try to pay the bus driver with the money squeezed into an imprint in my hand. Yet he would not take it. Instead he gave me the ticket and refused to take my money! As I was still rather flustered from the previous encounter, I continued to try to give him my money, but all he did was give me a thumbs up and a smile (minus a tooth or two). It was a little hard to believe that as hot and sweaty as I was that my looks still earned me a free ride… but such as it can be in Paraguay.

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

En la Isla Canoa se vive la verdad del Dios!

This week has both stretched and blessed me! As we finished our first full week of school, I also started VBS with my church in the evenings. So from 6:30am – 2:45/3:00pm I was at school, then headed to VBS at 3:00pm (getting there at 3:30), VBS started at 4pm and went to 6pm. This was then followed by clean up and traveling back home by 7pm! Still it was more than worth it!


Our theme was La Isla Canoa where the Truth of God Lives! Throughout the whole time we had around 50 kids attend the camp and more than half of the children had never come to the church before. Also around 13 children accepted Christ for the first time. We would start the night with registration, then singing and talks followed by a 5 center rotation (crafts (me!), Bible verse, Bible story, snack, and games), and finished with gathering together again to sing and go over some reminders. The students received points/stickers for attending, saying their verse the next day, and learning the English words from the day before (the students had 12 words a day!). On the last day, Saturday, the children were able to redeem their stickers for prizes. Both the songs : ), and the wonderful memories are still stuck in my head!

For this last Monday, being Valentine’s Day (which is very different from the US day!), my class and I studied the US holiday and the true story of St. Valentine. It was wonderful! We looked at John 15:13, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” It was wonderful joining in the discussions about how the love we show on the day is good, but how the love of God (clearly the greatest) and the love St. Valentine showed is so much greater!

Prayer Requests:
- Please pray that the seeds planted at VBS will continue to develop and grow inside of the hearts of the children and helpers that came.
- For my two new students in fifth grade. Both students are struggling academically compared to the other students, and my newest also struggles a lot in English as well. Please also pray for wisdom and discernment on my part to best reach and provide an education for all of my students!
- For the weeks ahead, that the students will grow closer together and that the new students will feel more and more welcomed.

Firsts:
- First time helping to lead VBS at my church here in Paraguay.


- First time having a bus driver that stopped again for us! We were on our way back from the grocery store with bags of groceries and decided to take the bus home. Our primary grocery store is about 10 plus blocks away and near IPS (the national health plan hospital). Because of that some of the buses do crazy things. We hopped on a bus that should have taken us home along the main road. Less than a block later and the bus turns off onto side streets. Suddenly we grab our bags and rush to the back of the bus to disembark. The bus comes to a screeching stop. People around us quickly start telling us that the bus will return to the main road so we step back and apologize to the driver as he starts to drive on again. We return to the main road and it starts going the opposite way that we want to go! So laughing, along with the rest of the bus, we pull the stop cord and get off the bus. We started walking back to the school the 10 plus blocks we had to go. When we had around 2-3 blocks left you will never guess what bus pulls up next to us on the busy street stopping to allow us back on the bus…Oh, yes our bus! At this point we realized how kind and generous it was for the bus to stop for us and how ridiculous it would be to ride it for 35 seconds as we get on the bus, run to the back of the bus and get off before it even picks up speed again! Still this was very surprising for us and brightening to one’s day to see such kindness!
- First time eating a Pitaya fruit (aka dragon fruit). You can see its beautiful pink and green outside wit h the dark purple inside. IT was delicious and tastes like a kiwi!
- First time growing a full  pepper in Paraguay! I finally was able to harvest a full pepper from my mini pots garden!
- First Paraguayan Valentine’s Day! Here this is the day of the lovers( or couples) and mostly only celebrated between them, where as friendship day is in July and follows more of the other part of our Valentine’s day.



Tuesday, February 8, 2011

2nd Post of the Year!!!!!! (Don't forget to check out the one from last Week too!)

          I cannot believe that an entire week has passed. It has been such a blessing to be back with my students. We have also learned and done so many things this week! The first few days we spent working on community building and classroom development. We read stories, discussed teasing and other challenges, and participated in team building activities that caused us to work together. I also have been reading the book the 5 Love Languages for Children and giving them a small survey to help confirm my beliefs of the student’s love language. I have colored coded the students name tag to help remind to show more love to these students in their main love language. Furthermore during the team building exercises the students wrote three positive comments on each of the other students, which I have written on their name tags. The Lord has blessed our class so much through these exercises and I am already seeing great improvements in the environment and interaction of the students.


           On Friday we had STEELER DAY!!!!! It was great, as I shared part of where I am from and teach educational topics through it. We started with learning about being a Christian competitor for Bible as we discussed personal experiences, why a Christian athlete should be different, positive examples (Troy Polamalu), and how we should aspire to compete like a Christ would. In math, we worked on fast addition as the students practiced quickly keeping score, as well as ratios (how they work and why we use them), and turning ratios into fractions, then decimals, and finally percents. Science we looked at how Newton’s laws apply to football as well as the formation of steel and the refining process! I was an incredible day. While the Steelers did not win, it did present a great opportunity to teach how to be a good loser. Besides, Steelers still have the best Super bowl record!!!!!!


Prayer Requests:
- Tomorrow I will be starting a VBS camp with my church, it will definitely be a fun learning experience as I am in charge of crafts! Please pray that we will have a good turnout for the children, that things will run smoothly, and most importantly that this will be an incredible evangelical opportunity.
- For the weeks ahead, that the students will grow closer together and that the new students will feel more and more welcomed.



Firsts:
- First time having an all day Steelers celebration with my international classroom!

- First time preparing for a VBS in Paraguay!!! ( I have assisted with other international VBS camps, but each one is so different and great in its own way!)

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Welcome Back!!!

      I can’t believe that I am writing this as the first blog back from summer vacation! So much has happened that I truly don’t know if I will be able to remember to tell all of the highlights. Our semester ended incredibly well with our Amusement Park. We had about 2 dozen parents show, along with board members, or directors, and the other elementary classes. The students did such a wonderful job and we so proud to show off all of the work that they did and learned! As you can see from some of these pictures it was certainly memorable and special.

      Yesterday was the first day of school for our second semester! I can’t believe we are already starting into our second semester! Time has truly flown so fast. My time at home was a wonderful break, time with family and friends. It was strange just jumping back into my life in the states, and just as strange jumping back here to Paraguay. My flights on the way back were also unique, and definitely created some firsts which you can see below!
     My students are back with the beginning of school, and it is so great to see them! We had a wonderful first two days and are trying to adjust to our new schedule. We have both a longer school day and more specials for our students (15 total) than the US standard schools so it always makes things a little different. Tomorrow we are having a wonderful day….it is officially Steelers’ Day!!!! I am incorporating Steelers into Bible (being a Christian competitor, looking for good Christian role models (famous Steelers making good choices),etc.), math (probability, ratios, and taking ratios, turning them into fractions, decimals, and percentages), and science (Newton’s laws as they apply to football, the formation and creation of steel and how that industry formed Pittsburgh and got our name, etc.).



Firsts:
- First time stuck in an airport for two days! Due to the massive amount of snow in Newark airport I was stuck there for a full two day before I was finally rerouted. It was especially a first in waiting in line for 17 hours straight to get a change of my flights.

- First time being told by a student that they will be absent for the first week, on the first day of school by a facebook message! We are not “friends” but still I got the message in the middle of the first day of school.
- First time extinguishing a fire in a friend’s apartment from a less than stellar air conditioner. Definitely a back-up job in the making! Courtney Weber: Firefighter- Please pray for this new semester, that we will be better able to shine God’s light to our students as we educate them as best we can.

 
Prayer Requests:
- For the teachers, old and new, that they will be able to be prepared and rested for this new semester.
- Any new students that are in the interview process or are yet to apply (I have one new student in fifth grade so far who had attended this school two years ago).