My favourite routines

So I wrote this way back at the beginning of March, decided it wan't finished, and then never found the words that should fit on the end. I found them now, and I hope you all forgive the delay: March has been an interesting month.

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Routine, I’ve found, is a beautiful, comforting thing. It helps keep me sane. The routine I keep with God is most certainly the best kind.

I pray with my children every morning, every break-time and every lunch time. I pray with my roommates before every meal, before every new endeavour and whenever we venture into the unknown, frightening or painful. I pray with the other teachers every day before school, or at least when I manage to get to the morning meeting. I pray every Monday evening with the director and his family and the rest of the English teachers, every Tuesday at Bible study and every Sunday in church.

I can honestly say I’ve never prayed so much in my life.

My kids do two sets of prayers in the morning: ‘Thank you God for’ and ‘Please God help’. We write them on the board at the beginning of our first lesson, everyone volunteering ideas for me to put up. ‘Thank you for milk’ is a common one, because we have milk every morning too and it’s an easy English word to remember. But we do get some more interesting ones too. ‘Thank you for all teachers’ is one of my favourites, right up there with ‘Thank you for rabbits’ and ‘Please help us get yoyos’.

My kids shot up hands when I ask them who wants to pray. They get upset, seriously throw tantrums and cry upset, if I don’t choose them. To pray, out loud, in English.

I used to dread praying out loud. It would have been mortifying if I’d been made to do it in French.

In 'fun reading' I generally try to read one Bible story to them before they all go off to read by themselves. We pick them from this beautiful picture book with easy, rhythmical and repeating words, and they watch eagerly, not put off in the least when we the same story over and over, day after day. They interrupt, pointing at characters in the book and telling me all about them: ‘He is bad!’ ‘She no listen.’ ‘Look, Miss Emma, six children!’

They never fail to notice Jesus. Never fail to notice God and his love, even when he’s not quite physically there: no old man in white to point at and identify with. Maybe he’s hidden in the folds, nothing more obvious than a light, a look on a characters face, something a character does.

They’re desperate to see him, joyous to see him, every time.

Strange surprises

It’s strange, the way change can happen.

It can be a smooth and subtle transition, a horrible bumpy and juddering affair, expected, surprising.

Definitely surprising.

An Unromantic Reality

I read this blog post by my friend a few days ago, and all the teachers agreed wholeheartedly with its content. Instead of trying to re-write the sentiment in my own words Lucy agreed to let me just share the original with you. Enjoy.

'God shows up in our reality. He shows up in our weakness. His eyes are not running across the earth looking for the woman who lives in a romantic movie set of perfection. He is looking for the real, the weak, and the one who needs Him.'

Student Stories

So here’s a little video I did some filming for last month, and which we got to see just yesterday. It’s already doing the rounds on facebook and other places but I thought I’d share it here too. It’s called ‘Student Stories’, which I think pretty much describes the contents.

Watch it, share it, get involved.

Word-Warriors and The Usual for Lunch.

I’ve got two bits for you today. The first is a tid-bit on one of my students, and the second a snap-shot of the everyday. I asked my father for advice on what he thought people wanted to read back home and these ideas are from those suggestions. I’m going to try to do something similar once a month; one thing about a student, one thing about the everyday.

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Word-Warriors.

One of my children has a habit of picking up things I never meant to teach her, words and phrases I never deliberately endeavoured to have the students learn. She’ll say them at odd moments, not all the time, and I find myself constantly surprised by it. “What are you doing?” she’ll say, a phrase I think I’ve only ever used as a quick jolt for when they’re being silly or naughty. Their attention will come back to me with a guilty giggle or smile, and mine turns to her pleasantly shocked yet again. I don’t think I’m ever doing anything particularly interesting when she asks, but she still seems to delight in ambushing me with this unexpected English phrase.

When 3 became 4

I’ve got an introduction to make.

Back right, the kid not in green? This is my new student. You'll know him as Jude.

He joined Grade 1 over a month ago, just after the October break, speaks the tiniest amount of English, and is very, very sporty. He has also been pseudo adopted by the oldest boy in the school, who plays basket ball with him and jokes with him and insists they sit next to each other in fun reading. Given that this older kid is by turns cheeky, rude, apathetic and really very smart (If a bit lacklustre in applying it) all the teachers are finding it mildly hilarious.

Jude is also a great advocate of cuddling. Which would be fine. Except, as I mentioned, he’s very sporty. And always seems to have a jacket or jumper on that he can never be persuaded to remove.

It’s always a slightly sweaty cuddle.

But he is the only kid in Grade 1 or 2 who can do a decent unassisted sit-up with any speed. Tradeoffs, I guess.