Friday, Nov 6

Yeah for Fridays! Today went pretty fast. I gave my science recup test, which was a little crazy because the kids who had to take it stayed in my class with the kids who didn’t; it was challenge to keep things quiet. Hopefully that went well for my students; we’ll see once I grade them! I have a few more tests to give to kids who were absent or need more time to study on Monday and then I’m done and grades for the 9 weeks are done. My kids worked really well the last hour of class (penmanship) so I gave them 10 minutes of free time to play games or whatever, which they really enjoyed; I mean come on it’s Friday. J I stayed after school to grade some things, headed home, and relaxed for bit. We had stir fry for dinner and cut up so many veggies, which was great to have the variety. After our great dinner, we seriously had food comas because Kirsty, Sarah and I all went to lay down and fell asleep! I woke up later and watched some ALIAS with Laura Beth and hit the hay.

Thursday, Nov 5

Thursdays aren’t too bad usually because I have more prep hours, but I had to finish making my recup test for Friday during that time, which took a while. The math one was hard to make with all the diagrams and symbols. I had to give a reading recup test at the end of the day during my seatwork hour which was hectic. Half of the class needed to take this test and other half didn’t. So I sent half of my class to be with Jacki since she usually does my seatwork, and the other half who had to take it were with me. We also had less time than usual because our bell for our classes is rung by hand, not electronically. So if they guy (Don Humberto) doesn’t keep track of time, the bell is late. This happened for this hour so my kids had 10 less minutes to work on their test. Some of them didn’t study much plus not having enough time…it was frustrating to me and to them. Then I had some of the students who needed to take the language recup test stay after school to take it during tutorias. They were most of the same kids. Many of them (whether from not understanding the written English or just not really thinking it through) didn’t understand that directions. So I to constantly explain the same directions over and over. I wondered if they had even read the directions at all. After they had finished and left I was spent from the frustration of how recup tests were done, hoping my kids would do well, but knowing for some of them it wouldn’t matter. To be honest, today was a day that I said, “I don’t want to be here. I didn’t go to school for this; I don’t know if I’m doing it right or making sense to these kids…” I’m really not trying to be a downer, but it was an end of my rope moment and I just wanted to be home, even for a few minutes. The rest of the night I just thought a lot and relaxed and got ready for tomorrow.

Wednesday, Nov 4

We had chapel today and Mr. Laurelais taught about Samson. The kids really liked it actually and were pretty attentive. I decided to sit with my kids instead of stand. I think I’m going to do it more often. I sat by some of my favorite kids (I know we aren’t supposed to have favorites, but come on, it’s going to happen) and they were just so cute sitting closer to me. One of my girls was playing with my hair, which felt great and one of my boys was asking me all these great questions. I wish that being a teacher required more of the relational part and not as much of the disciplinarian part. I enjoy being with my kids so much more when I don’t have to tell them to sit down, please be quiet, I need your attention. It’s refreshing to be able to hang out with them. I think that may be something I may be realizing is different with this job than the other experiences I’ve had with kids. With Young Life for example, my “job” was to form relationships/friendships with kids; I was more of a mentor/adult friend/leader and less of a disciplinarian. I feel the scales have tipped more the other way for teaching. It’s not bad, just something to get used to and figure out how I can best do my job being me and having the experiences I’ve had.
Today was kinda crazy too because I had to scramble to finish my recuperation tests for the kids who had failed reading and language so they could be copied before tomorrow. One thing that has been frustrating with these recup tests is that the kids are told they are taking these tests the day before. The tests are made by their teachers, but it covers all the material from the 9 weeks. Then the administration was like ‘There’s not enough room on the sheet we give their parents to tell them they are taking a test to put all the themes they need to study for the test.’ So we just had to give our kids the page numbers of what they should study. That’s hard even for a high schooler or someone in college. If they had planned ahead, these kids could know specifically what to study and have a better chance of doing well on this test. But now these kids don’t really have much of chance; I don’t know how many of my kids will really do better on this test than the other tests during the 9 weeks. Then it’s almost a waste of their time and our time. Other than that, today was a normal Wednesday of going to town after school for internet and groceries. We stayed pretty late and had some trouble getting mototaxis back up, but it ended up working out alright.

Tuesday, Nov 3

Today started out well, but I had a new seating chart. Some of my kids need to stay near front because they either get easily distracted, can’t see well, or they need to be up front so I can keep an eye on them. I think I have realized that some kids will keep talking and doing what they do no matter where you put them! I also started a new reward system, where they get to earn stars for how well they behave through the day. We’ll see how it works! Later in the day, I got fed up with the kids trying to talk over them when I was teaching so they wrote lines. I explained to them why I need them to listen: respect for me and respect for their classmates when they speak, trying to help them learn so they can do well, learning patience and self control. I explain it’s because I care and I’m not trying to take away their fun. I had tutorias after school today for reading so we played some games to study for their vocab quiz tomorrow. Afterwards I walked home, but realized I had forgotten things at school to help me make my recuperation tests so I had to walk back. Recuperation tests are allowed (might be required) by the Education Department of Honduras. If a child fails their subject for the parcial (9 weeks) they can take a recuperation test and that will be substituted in their test grade for the 9 weeks. I spent the evening making my recup tests and relaxing.

Deep thoughts: We ultimately are alone on this faith walk; it’s just me and God ultimately, no person, not even your spouse will ever fill you like God does, lead you the way God does, will be your source like God is. Just a hard realization I guess sometimes to be reminded of that. God provides us with so many friends and family to walk with us through life and help us on our faith journey and he loves community and relationship and created us for that. But truly, ultimately when it really comes down to it, its you and God, he should be (and IS) enough to fill us.

Sunday and Monday, November 1 and 2

Sunday
Wow, November already! Today was a typical, but needed Sunday. It was really relaxing, no schedule kind of day. I started figuring out my 9 week grades, which took longer than I anticipated. I had some good convos over coffee time, had some great fresh fruit salad, and went to church later in the evening.

Monday
Another week! Some administrators were still here from Tegucigalpa and earlier in the day our principals were coming around to take some of our kids’ books to show them they were working in them. It was frustrating though because they would take some of my kids’ math books during math and language during language. Therefore some of my kids couldn’t do the lesson or work because they didn’t have their books for that hours. I also finishing final grades for the 9 week, which is a lotta work, but needs to get done. Done with my first nine weeks…crazy!

Random Thoughts

I was looking through my pictures tonight and I have realized I have been blessed to have met so many truly amazing people in the last 4 years and even the last year of my life. I know its all cliché and I’m not trying to sound mushy, but really God has been so faithful in allowing me to meet such quality people. I wish with all my heart I could keep in constant meaningful contact with all of you. I hate that living out of the country makes that even harder than it already is to keep in touch. I hate that even if I tried my hardest and I was in the United States, life happens and I will lose contact with friends who are amazing people. So to all of you who have been a part of my life in the last 4 years and this past year, THANK YOU for the blessing you have been to me: in who you are, in the memories we have shared together, and for bringing joy and wisdom to my life.

Saturday Oct 31- Fiesta Tipica

Today was Fiesta Tipica; no Halloween for me! After all of the practicing and craziness, it was here! I donned my tipical dress (borrowed from Teguc) and all my natural looking jewelry. The day didn’t start out the best though because we had miscommunication about mototaxis in the morning. One of our neighbors said he’d take us all down, but he told us on separate occasions. So we were trying to figure out another taxi and not be late to the fiesta. When finally arrived, I was already slightly frustrated from the mototaxi confusion and then we had to start selling right away. My champa was called La Fritanga, which included all things fried: tacos, enchiladas, tajaditas, pastelitos. Apparently it’s everyone’s favorite food, too because we were ridiculously busy! I felt like I was back in the strawberry fields at the stand except now everyone was yelling at me in Spanish what they wanted and I was trying to make change, give them their ticket and remember what they had so I could tell the other teachers in my booth (Sarah and one of the Spanish teachers) what they had ordered. Meanwhile the program was starting, but we had no chance to leave our champa at all until the program was done. Sarah and I were disappointed that we didn’t get to see our kids do their dances because we were so busy in our champa. We were stressed out and done by the end of the selling time. I finally got to get out of the champa and tried some of the other food. I had some tipico food like beans, tortillas and salsa as well as this sweet stuff that tasted like sweet bread pudding.
The fiesta was starting to wind down, so we helped clean up, changed out of our dresses, and went to Guancascos. Then Jacki and I went shopping for food and at the market and returned to Guancascos. The other girls headed up, but me and Sarah stayed longer, waiting for Gustavo, our mototaxi ride up the mountain. My stomach had been hurting all day and I didn’t know what other medicine to get, so I got some anti parasite medicine just in case and it seemed to do the trick. Well something was wrong with Gustavo’s taxi so we waited forever for him and finally decided to call Samuel to take us up. I just chilled the rest of the night to make my stomach feel better.