CMS News

A delightful part of each week for the last few months has been teaching at one of the local schools. I particularly enjoy the 1st and 2nd Classes. The regular 1st Class teacher sits in on the lessons, and I love watching her response to some of the different things we do, as well as the enjoyment of the children.

Teachers here have a written page for each lesson, which they read out, and the children write it down word for word. Often the teacher doesn’t understand the material fully. The only teaching tool used is a blackboard and chalk.

In my lessons over the past weeks the children have made Adam and Eve out of sticks from a tree; they have played games such as treasure hunts, looking for things that God created; they have planted a garden and learnt to take care of it; and have made origami birds (as Noah sent a bird from the Ark to see if the water had receded).

Each week the teacher has become more involved in helping me.

I have learnt that for 1st and 2nd Class I need to lower the level of teaching. None of the children knows how to read or write (even their names) and they don’t know the alphabet. It is a challenge to come up with a variety of memory verse games, and teaching activities that don’t involve reading and writing, and use only resources that can be found in their environment!