Good afternoon!
Last night, our missionary hosts, Bruce and Jeanine, gave us a few phrases to learn so we can sort of communicate with the students. So today we practiced a few:
Wasuze otye (wah -soo-zay oh-tee-ah): how did you spend the night/good morning; and you respond by saying, bulungi (boo-loon-gee), or good.
Webale (way-bah-lay): thank you
Tyama (tee-ah-ma): sit down
The kids giggled a lot when, after their elaborate greeting to me, I greeted them back in their own language. But they responded back with bulungi and we went on with the lesson.
This morning's lessons were a little rough. I had P2 and P3 and they still speak mostly Lusoga in the classroom. So explaining the water cycle to non-english speaking 2nd graders was basically impossible. The principal came and interpreted the lesson for me because he teacher didn't even know what I was trying to say. It was a little disheartening. I should have just stuck with trees and animals or something. Even the principal said it was over their heads. :/
Explaining the producers and consumers of a food chain to non-english speaking 3rd graders was Not as difficult, but I'm not sure they understood all the concepts. Anyway, I explained what producers and consumers were and the kids drew their own examples in their notebooks. Then we went on a walk around the school grounds and pointed out real examples of consumers and producers.
This afternoon, I taught P6 and this was probably the most rewarding lesson thus far. We made mini windmills! The lessons were supposed to take 45 minutes, but this one took twice as long because we had to troubleshoot some parts. Anyway, huuuge success and I cannot wait to upload photos for you all to see. And! The photos were taken by the science teacher who, before yesterday, hadn't used a camera at all!
The windmills also opened up great conversation with the principal. He asked way more questions than I could answer, but it paved the way for future thinking as far as utilizing wind energy at the school. At first it boggled me that nobody in the village has thought about this stuff before, but then I remembered not everyone is mechanically, technologically, or engineer minded; nor do they always have the resources to even try.
Another special part of the day was visiting the kitchen at the school. Natalie and I walked over to take pics and we met the cook, Rebek and her son Anise (an-ih-see) and checked out her kitchen. I a not sure how she does not have lung cancer, because that kitchen was sooo smokey. Anyway, she showed us the small area and then gave us the opportunity to serve the kids their porridge. I've never been so humbled; these kids eat basically watered down cream of wheat and they don't complain, they accept with gratitude because most of them came to school without breakfast and may not get to eat much at home, if indeed they even have a home to go back to. I can't really describe how I feel about it. I just love those kids and I've barely even met them. They have stolen my heart.
So until another post, blessings to all.
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