Strength: Confia en el Senor, de todo corazon, y no en su propia inteligencia...(Proverbs 3:5-6)

My fourth graders doing a Bible skit to
 show the consquences of sin!

        This semester is flying by faster and faster! We are quickly approaching half way through this second semester! This last weekend was both a great time with friends and productive! Always a great combination! On Friday afternoon, ACA joined in our first head to head competition with Faith Christian School in soccer. Both our girls and boys team play a wonderful game and did our school proud. While we did not win either of the games, we did learn a lot and turned out a good performance in our new uniforms! It was wonderful to see the support of parents, students, and teachers at the game gaining more school spirit! Even Bailey, our youngest fan at 10 months old, sported a very cute ACA onesie!

         On Saturday I went for my usual grocery run with the added bonus of a 10+ block workout as we carry all of our groceries back. It also keeps you in check with buying just the right amount! This warm up was followed by an “Insanity” workout with my workout heroine/friend Stacy. Insane only begins to describe the workout (though you do feel great an hour later). I went in the evening to my new friends from England apartment and had a great time getting to know them better! Sunday was church in the morning, always a blessing, and then our weekly game of volleyball at night! In between the above I was able to plan and get all my work done for the next two weeks of classes as I have started a master’s class that will be in the evenings for these two weeks. Oh, and I was fighting off a cold! Isn’t the Lord incredible! He truly provides the strength you need!

I guess I just have to take classes from
schools whose color is crimson!

          Things are definitely busy as we are one week away from the Parade of Nations and I am just diving into a new master’s class! Though the strength the Lord has blessed me with this last weekend will continue to bless me in these weeks ahead!

Prayer Requests:

- Please pray for this cold to end quickly and for all of the sicknesses going around in all of Paraguay to also end quickly! Especially please pray for those people who have caught Dengue Fever. You can catch it from mosquitoes and it can be deadly.

- Please pray for the students and teachers as we prepare for the Parade of Nations. Hopefully this will continue to be a wonderful opportunity to share international missions and God’s heart for the lost with our school! (my classes have been thriving in our Bible lessons preparing for this week. They are loving learning about what to pray for the other nations (Russia and India) and we are also learning about the other religions in these countries. Our classes are having incredible discussions that are truly blessing me and the students!)

- Please pray for my master’s class. I am taking it with 3 other ACA teachers. It certainly makes for a long day with 3 hours of night class each day after teaching in the morning!

Firsts:

- First time having my students beg to come back early from their lunch/recess to work on a science project in my classroom. Doesn’t It just warm a teacher’s heart to the core!

- First time taking a master’s class! Yesterday I started my first day of my first master’s class! I am taking the graduate courses offered by the University of Alabama for Elementary Education masters degree! My first class is in Social Studies.

- First time eating an English cooked bread and pudding here in Paraguay! While I have had bread and pudding before, it certainly tasted good coming from some new English teachers at the British school here in Paraguay. It is wonderful to be blest with even more friends abroad.

My students hard at work on the science project
that they chose OVER their lunch/recess time!

Superstitious Watermelon and Bus Strikes



Crazy Fruit of the Week: Red Pear!

      Travel on el colectivo (a.k.a a bus), is always an adventure. As the main source of  transportation for most of the population in this 3rd world capital city it can be dangerous and unstable at times. Still I am blessed with the quick access and the number of buses that go past our compound. On Monday there was a city wide bus strike for almost all of the bus lines. Those that did not go on strike found problems as pedestrians began throwing stones at the buses that were running and did not take long to stop as well. The whole town was thrown for a turn as suddenly many people were stuck. In fact, almost every person was affected in multiple ways. The strike was over a new rule changing the maximum age of the buses to be reduced to 25 years old(for safety reasons as with these conditions anything over 5 is usually starting to struggle)! As only a few bus lines have buses that were younger than this new maximum age limit, they decided to strike. This is just a small peek into the condition of the buses that regularly fall apart and are held together by tape and a prayer. The strike did end by noon, but needless to say it was a large deal and greatly influenced the city. As this is my main source of transportation, I was grateful that I did not have to go out on Monday and lived on the same compound as my school. You never do truly appreciate what you depend on until it is taken away.

      Superstition is deeply rooted in Paraguay. This week I had my eyes opened to a strange new focus for superstition, … the watermelon. Oh yes, whether or not you realized it, the watermelon is very very dangerous. For example, the Paraguayans believe it can greatly hurt you if you drink water before or after eating watermelon. Also you cannot drink milk after eating watermelon. You cannot eat watermelon right before bed, or you may not wake up. The list goes on and on… In fact, for the most part you can only have watermelon right after you wake up from your afternoon siesta and before you have dinner (and even that can be a problem). I must admit I wondered if some other melon or fruit farmers got jealous of the watermelon and decided to start some superstitious rumors about the terrifying watermelon! I see the next antagonist for veggie tales being a huge fierce and deadly watermelon. Yet when you think about other cultures and even our lives, we often miss the superstitious things that get away from us and build and build over time. Without even noticing it, things we over think or hold to a high esteem get out of hand and it becomes hard to see the absurdity.

Firsts:

- First time leaping from a moving bus. On Saturday, we had a crazy bus driver (like so many) on the way back from the grocery store. While we pulled the cord for it to stop the driver only decided to slow (around 5 miles per hour), at which time Jenn (with all her groceries) jumped off the moving bus! I immediately pulled the cord again, the bus slowed unfortunately right in front of a cement telephone pole. As it picked up again I too leaped from the bus with two huge shoulder bags of groceries (that were thankfully balanced). Finally the bus slowed almost to a stop and Stacy was able to step off right before it screeched away.
-        First time having a red pear! It does taste almost exactly like a normal pear, but how could I pass up trying a red one!

- First time hearing of the Watermelon superstition of Paraguay.
- First time in Paraguay during a city wide bus strike.
- First time seeing “Awn + Los Jonas Bros” with a heart around it on the back of the bus seat. Slightly humorous!


Density and Buoyant Force Lab!!!

 Prayer Requests:
- Safety is always a huge part of our lives here. Please pray for our safety, especially with our traveling, even in the day to day, and every time we step out the doors we are putting ourselves in harm’s way.
- This coming Monday, I will officially be starting my very first Masters’ Class! Please pray for wisdom, balance, and the great opportunity to learn and grow!

The Heroes in Our Lives!

          Today is officially, “el Día de los Heroes” (the day of the Heroes)! With this special day comes a day off school too! My day started off with the wonderful pleasure of turning off my 5:30am alarm! Unfortunately I only got to sleep less than a half an hour, as our friendly neighbors across the trash creek behind our apartments started the party (which to them is most days) at 6:00am very loudly! While two possible plans of action came to mind

1. Go to my classroom and curl up on the floor… or…
2. Could a paintball marker take out a boom box from 30 yards?
I chose to do neither of the two options, but was up and filling my day with school work, relaxing, and time with friends! The Lord is truly good!

         On a holiday celebrating heroes, it makes one think through the heroes in their own life. For the last few weeks I have been studying great heroes of the Bible with my 5th grade class. The Bible truly is filled with so many wonderful examples, that we should strive to follow (from Ruth, to Hannah, to Samuel and so on). I have also been blessed with Heroes in my own life. For starts, what incredible parents I have been blessed with! And I am also very partial to the best twin brother in the world! Not only are my family members my heroes, but I can see other heroes in my life in the little things. There are so many people that go above and beyond for the Lord! Even this last chapel (as I mentioned in my last post), I shared the story of Jim Elliot and his family. “He is no fool, who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose!” What an incredible and powerful story! As well, the incredible strength and amount of forgiveness and love shown by his family after his murder is definitely heroic. I have been blessed with several more questions about this story! And then there are my heroes back home, through the small acts that mean so much. In the your encouragement, your prayers, and your support! Thank you! And happy day of the Heroes!

Prayer Requests:

- While we are incredibly grateful for the rain we have had for the past weeks and all of its benefits for the Chaco, please pray for the dangers that the rain can cause with the flooding and more.

- As always, please pray for the students, teachers, and parents.

Courtney picked a peck of purple peppers....

- Praise! I thank the Lord for a friend who will be bringing me back a new camera from the states! My camera was accidentally dropped by a student 1.5 weeks ago and is permanently broken. Hence the lack of new pictures with this posting. The blessing is that this friend was going back to the states for a little over a week and I was able to buy a camera on Amazon and have it shipped to her while she is there! Lithium batteries cannot be shipped so this is wonderful!

Firsts:

- First time seeing and buying Purple Peppers!!!! Truly they are naturally purple! They smell and taste more like the green peppers than the red or yellow.

- First time celebrating el Día de los Heroes!

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.

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.

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!)

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).