“The Most Rewarding Day”

Today was one of the most rewarding days on this program. It started in the Assi Illam center, an orphanage that is converted into a day care in the morning to provide an income for the orphanage. When we arrived in the morning the children (all between the ages of 2-4) were excitedly running around hall. After a small morning snack, which consisted of milk and biscuits the fun activities began. We started with singing some nursery rhymes, which they sang and danced along to. We then brought out some of the toys that we brought as donations from home, the children were most excited about the bubbles. The children at the day care were full energy but sadly at 12 we had to leave to prepare for the next task of the day.

At 1.30pm we arrived at the Christ King primary school to teach some of the the 4th graders and 5th graders some English. We started with a small ice breaker activity where the students had to tell us 3 things about them to gauge their level of English followed by a fun game of taboo, where the children had to describe words and the rest of the class had to guess what word the students were trying to describe. We then moved on to the second class activity where the children had to complete sentences using the correct tenses and verbs. We finally ended the classes with a fun game of hangman. The children at the school were very well behaved and it was a great pleasure teaching them.
The final task of the day was to meet the children of the Seam’s center. When we arrived the children gave us such a warm welcome and sang us a few songs. We then had some free time with the children where we got the chance to do some arts and crafts with the girls with the donations that we brought with us and then we played some board games with the boys. They taught us how to play an Indian board game called karam. The children were an absolute thrill to play with, they were so patient with us when we were learning the game and were so supportive of us even when we were making them lose! For me, the Seams center visit was the highlight of my day. The children were so great and so welcoming and I had a wonderful time with them.
Mais