Day 6 - Teachers Being Taught

Hello everyone, I have much to share since we haven’t been able to write in a few days. Everyone has been so busy! Well where to begin. On Thursday, all of the teachers had their normal classes which went very well. All of the teachers are beginning to bond with their students and create wonderful relationships. In Cliff Lehner’s class, there is a struggle with having to many students and not enough computers. But with the help of his assistants, James and Brett Joslin, the class is going very well. The students are very anxious to learn more about navigating the computer. Then in Dave Johnson’s class of two students the working relationship between the three of them is excellent. One of his students is very well educated in their math studies, while the other is not. Both of the students work with the guidance of Dave and they all help each other to reach their goals and move on to the section. In Diane Joslin’s class, the students love the children’s books she is both giving and sharing with them. They ask so many questions and are so anxious to learn about all she has to share! In Art’s U.S. History class, there seems to never be a dull moment. As they progress from past to present, the knowledge the student’s are gaining about our country brings up many interesting topics and questions. The student’s are so eager to know more about everything Daphni, his assistant, has to share as well. This is similar in Ken Johnson’s Marketing class. The student’s were recently assigned a certain budget in groups, and they had to design a marketing campaign for a certain project with their budget. Again, the desire to learn never ceases and the conversations are always flowing. I can now speak with even more experience from Melanie Walls class as I (Ashley) am her assistant. We are overwhelmed with joy at the relationships we are building with our students. At the beginning we felt like we would never be able to connect with these students, and Melanie was terrified that the students wouldn’t do well in the course because of our differences. We felt that they had spent so much money, time, and effort just to be in the class that we would never be able to fulfill what they were looking for. Much to our surprise, and God’s will in all of our classrooms, the bonds we are making with these student’s are not only professional but personal as well. Each student has a story, and knowledge of their own to share with us. We are learning as much from them as they are from us. Leaving them at the end of next week will be one of the biggest challenges of this trip.

On a side note of Thursday; Daphni, Crystal, and I were able to “break free” from campus and spend the day exploring Nairobi. This was a special treat because my birthday is Wednesday the 18th and they wanted to do something for me before Crystal left with the Radically Changed group for South Africa. We first attended Chapel, where David from RC played his new saxophone that was donated to us to give to him. He calls his saxophone “baby” and is currently working on a more formal name. He played beautifully and you can tell how much he loves his gift, we know that he will use it to change many lives for the Lord. After chapel he took us three girls to Westgate Mall which is more like our Twelve Oaks in Novi. This was quite the experience to see the best, and almost the worst parts of Africa all in one week. After the mall we got pizza and Thai food, who would have thought, for lunch. And ended our adventure with a trip to the market where we found David, Japho, and Crystal some warmer clothes for their trip. We then spent the rest of our evening cutting, and labeling the CD cases to help prepare for the group’s trip to South Africa. However, the best part of this day was the very end. You could tell that the time was coming for the five of us to say good night, and we were all dreading the moment. Thoughts of never seeing each other again or for a long time crossed our minds and we all had become so close in just that one day. So David suggested we all join hands and pray. That was when we knew, as each one of us individually prayed through our tears, that God was with us. No, we did not know what our future holds or if our paths would lead us together again like we were that evening. But we all knew in our hearts that God has a plan, and that his will is what we all want. By believing in that we were comforted and we knew that no matter where our lives go, we will all be used in some way to bless each other and those around us. We also knew at that moment, that even though we were all separating the next day to go make a difference in the lives of others, that others were already making a difference in our lives. I pray that as this trip continues this will be a reoccurring theme for our group. That we will make a large impact in others lives, and that we will also learn from them.