We were excited to be heading out to Kantolomba again today. As you saw from last week’s blogs, there is some great momentum building in the project, through people’s willingness to participate in English skills workshops, teacher training, lively reading sessions.... It is a momentum of experimentation, possibility, and fun! It is our intention for the week ahead to work with this momentum to tap into the rich resources in the project. And to assist us, we set out today with a new schedule! We want to make sure that everyone gets to participate in the activities they want to participate in. So in the new schedule, we make sure there is no overlap between, say, the pre-school English teacher training and the adult English classes—no small feat!
First, a few beautiful morning scenes from Castle Lodge
Truly an oasis
An open area just across the street from the lodge
We go through the new schedule with Theresa in the car on the way in to Kantolomba so that, when we arrive we all know what our first move will be, we can leap out of the car with as much energy and readiness as our welcoming committee greets us with!
We project concentration onto the fellow on the left.
Theresa used the wave of enthusiastic greeters to practice her portraits.
Arriving at the Living Compassion property, we saw empty space where the lines of people at the water tap had been last week. Good news for the local community - the water is back on. And good news, too, for our welcoming committee of young people who get to race down the hill and skip over towards the car as we pull into the gate. They get a good, clear run today with no water containers blocking their way! When there is water available at local taps throughout the community, people who live at a distance come to Living Compassion more just for drinking water, and they go to a tap nearer their homes for less health-critical water for laundry and bathing and such.
Theresa, Jen and Phil head over to the pre-school English classroom to continue teacher training, and Anna heads over to the carpentry corner to let Charles know it’s time to put down the chisel for now and pick up the English textbooks.
See how many tools you can find! We love the way this photo captures some of the different ways the wood is being worked with and some of the different skills involved in the work.
Pascal working in the shade of the tree
Pascal smiles every morning as we walk up the path. We greet each other in Bemba: “Mwashibukeni!” - Good morning/how did you wake? And then exchange the same greetings in English—only fair that we each get to practice!
The preschool training is a great process. Today, Phil walked us through an overview of the materials on the computer that supplement the program. Then each person who will run an English learning classroom got a manual of the whole curriculum. There is so much to it, and we all decide that having the whole team learn very well how to deliver a single lesson is the key. That same process can then be applied to the other lessons. As we sketch out the schedule for the next phase of the project, we make a note to be sure to put in ample time for the teachers to learn the material in the coming months.
Learning the computer parts of the program
Getting familiar with the manuals
Phil assisting Georgina
It was fun to be back in the rhythm of English learning after the weekend. We find that after just a couple of coaching sessions last week, Charles has retained much of what he learned and is able to navigate the computer controls comfortably, nimbly playing and pausing the audio tracks for our listening practice exercises. We are emphasizing learning the tools, more than the content itself, since next Monday they will be on their own!
Charles with some different tools
At 11:30, the English-speaking team gathers for their lesson. Charles begins by explaining the structure of the class: warm-up, review, new stuff, warm-down. Zambia played Zimbabwe right here in Ndola on Saturday, and soccer analogies abound. We talk about how, when soccer players arrive at the stadium to play an important match, they don’t just jump out of the car or off the bus straight onto the field. Instead, they warm up, they prepare the body and mind so that they know it’s time to play soccer. And for us, we warm up with simple questions - “how was your weekend?” - so that we know it’s time to speak English!
Warmed-up into English mode, and ready to read together!
Charles does a wonderful job of leading the class, and the team does a wonderful job of participating. We had a great moment when we were answering some reading comprehension questions at the end of a passage. Beatrice volunteered to answer but couldn’t quite get all of the information. Someone else was about to answer, but we decided instead to use it as an opportunity to walk through HOW to find the answer if you don’t know it. It was a chance to stop and experience the process of learning even more than the content of what we were learning. One thing we all realized is that by “not knowing the answer” and being willing to work it out out loud, we can learn not only more about the topic we are focusing on but also different ways of learning from each other. Very exciting to watch.
Beatrice takes a turn at leading the reading.
At the end of the class, we look at how to warm down, how to move from the challenging material and acknowledge how much we’ve accomplished and learned in the class. We look again to the soccer analogy: what do footballers do when they finish a big match? They hug, Georgina points out. We see that the equivalent for us in our English class might be to celebrate all of the successes we’ve had in the class. And so we do!
After lunch, the English-speaking team gathers together for another internet session. Veronica and Theresa, who learned how to find Kantolomba on the satellite map last week, show the rest of the team how to do it. This time we also saw the Monastery on the map, and it was fun to see how many questions this brought up for the team: Where do you meditate? Do you each live alone? What is your schedule?
Last year when we were here they had asked us to show them what meditation was. Today a few reported that they do it from time to time and find it very useful.
Getting to know Google
Closing in on the Monastery
The knitters were back at work once the cooking and dishes for the day were done. Many scarves headed your way!
Knitting party on the lawn
We thought these were some pretty good portraits too!
Regina
Foster
Pauline
Eugenia and Estella
Christine is the fastest on the team, all agree.
Lucy
Sometimes the best portraits do not show a face.
A portrait of peace
As we leave Kantolomba for the day, we reflect on the success of the new schedule. It felt like it really kept the energy moving to go from one activity to another through the day in this new way. Looking forward to seeing what opportunities for experimentation Life offers tomorrow!
Last portrait of the day, Sandra poses for us by the Living Compassion sign.
Oh, wait, one more: Scooby left, Tiger right. These are the best cared-for dogs we have met in Zambia; they belong to Beauty
