11/3 Preschool Plan & Garden Walk

Monday, November 3

On breakfast duty again - Ugi -so I could come in around 6:20! I then walked with the school crew to school with Vicenti and Rehema. They all get to school at about 7:15 and then do their chores until 8am when school starts.

I came back, had breakfast - woke up sleepy Jack - and prepared for the preschoolers. I got some small notebooks from the office and 7 pencils - one for each and I put their names on each. My plan is to have them do a page for a each letter of the alphabet where they have to write the letter and them draw some pictures of the things that start with that letter. All went well except for Vicenti and Rehema who are just a bit too young. Rehema was really trying and got out a couple A's and I was so proud!! Such a little thing made me so happy!

Then we did some water coloring - that was amazing. They all actually sat still for about 20 minutes busily painting away. But shortly after that the chaos returned. It is getting better as they are starting to listen a bit more.

In the afternoon Jack and I took all the little ones on a walk to the garden which is just past Indiaís house They are lots of things growing in there - from beans and lettuce to some flowers and peppers. I think we eat a lot from the garden. The plants are all in raised beds of soil, which I found so interesting because I had just started The Poisonwood Bible where the Baptist Minister after arriving in the Congo in 1959 wouldnít listen to the house Mama about how to plant a garden. He cleared away the jungle and made the garden flat. This was all fine and dandy until the rains came and washed away all the seedlings. Upon seeing this he made raised beds - like burial mounds - for all the plants and they never washed away again. (Note that his plants did end up growing but never grew any fruits. He thought it was because there were no bees for pollination. This is not a problem here - there are bees!).

After the garden field trip we decided to clean up the Children's Village. Usufu, Joshua, Vicenti and Rehema filled a huge bag with garbage. And just scraps of garbage - small blue plastic pieces, bits of duct tape pieces, cardboard pieces and a variety of small toys (legos and beads). As a prize we gave them each a roll of Smarties - with the promise thar they had to brush their teeth extra well tonight!

Sara (the Volunteer Coordinator) and three other volunteers returned from their Gorilla trek to Rwanda this afternoon. They had been gone for a week and it sounded like an amazing experience! I canít wait to see all the photos. It was great to have more faces and people to share the work with. Jack and I had been on for a lot while they were all away. I am in no way complaining - it was just great because it gave us more opportunity to get to the know the kids faster and spend more time with them.

Who would have thought that I would have to come all the way to Tanzania to try Tae Bo (?sp)! At 5:15 in the Rec Hall, Sara, Carolyn, Ellie, Lindsay and myself did an hour and half Tae Bo DVD! Hot and fun - I told Sara to let me know when they were going to do it again, because I would love to join!

Jack was helping out with bath time, showered and then went back to Tarangire to help with dinner. Our dinner was great - listening to the stories of Rwanda was amazing.  The genocides & memorials were very disturbing. Africa is such a vast continent with so much to learn about and so much to seeÖ...