Quoted

I keep a journal.  Though the journal is not a traditional style where one would record the events of the day and reflect.  My journal is filled with anything and everything - a list of the books I read last year, a map of places where I've traveled, Bible verses, song lyrics, prayers, poems, and sketches; and scattered in between all that are pages of quotes.  Quotes I come across while reading, listening to podcasts, or just stumble upon.  When flipping through the journal, these inspirational quotes bring a smile to my face, cause me to ponder, and often encourage my day.  I would like to share a few with you throughout this post as I share about the past couple of weeks here.  I hope these little phrases can also bring some encouragement to your day as well.

I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you make them feel.     - Maya Angelou 

The ping-pong table is the first activity pulled out and set up when the clock strikes 2:30pm and club in Letovice begins.  Until we clean up to go home in the evening, the ping-pong table is in constant use!  I enjoy joining in with the kids in their game of Around the Table, though I usually split my time at club in Letovice between the ping-pong table, foosball, and just sitting and chatting with the      kids.  Last week, I spent a good portion of the club time with a few half-leaders as we played many games of foosball, rotating teams, and pretty evenly winning and losing.  During all the games, one of the kids playing foosball had just lost the match and said with a smile, "This is really a horrible way to have fun!"  I replied, "Rematch?"  No answer was needed as the opponents were already propelling the ball into the table and sliding the scoreboards back to zero to start the next game. 

Do what you love, and you will never have a problem with Mondays.  - unknown

Mondays teaching English Class is one of my favorite times of the week.  I am so proud of these English Class students!  Recently, the translators and I have noticed a spike in the students' English abilities and their confidence in speaking as well.  Beginners class has been working on our theme "In the City" as they add new words to their vocabulary and to their city maps.  I've repeated a few games the past few weeks, just with the new vocabulary each week.  I wondered if the students wouldn't want to repeat the games since we had played them so recently (I had a few back-up activities planned just in case), but the kids were thrilled and practically begging to repeat the favored games!  Even more surprising was the translators may have been the most excited for the familiar games - these brilliant translators have been a blessing to these classes as they encourage and excite the kids about the lessons too!  As we were finishing the lesson last week, one of the translators put in his request for the next lesson saying, "Hey Kendra, we haven't played BINGO in a while."  Just like sometimes I think the moms at Little Linguists have more fun at class than the toddlers, I wonder if it is the translators who have the most fun at English Class too.

Recent Favorites have been Memory, GoFish, and Dominos with the vocabulary.

We have also played multiple rounds of Chair Swap

(1) Nearly all the kids want to play our Gated City game, and I'm grateful for the larger space to play more games!  (2) The students are working hard on their city maps.

Teachers affect eternity.  No one can tell where their influence stops.  - Henry B. Adams

With the start of the new year, Next Step English Class has had a few changes.  Some students were unable to come back to class due to other after-school activities, though a couple new students have recently joined the class.  I have enjoyed seeing the students welcoming their new classmates so invitingly into the classroom.  They ask the new student to sit by them, be a partner for games, and requested that the new students sit in out "Special Person Chair" so we can get to know them better.  

The Next Step students are making big leaps in English!  My translator and I have been really impressed with this new advancement in the language, so our class activities are involving even more story writing and sentence building activities.  I'm excited for how they will grow even more in the next half-year at English Class.

(1) Making "Homerun Sentences" (2) Creating Rebus Stories

Every experience God gives us, every person He put into our lives, is the perfect preparation for the future that only he can see.  - Corrie Ten Boom

Many of the toddlers in Little Linguists have been coming since the start of the school year, and the kids are developing friendship bonds with each other.  The past couple weeks, we have had some new toddlers and mothers come to see the class, and though the child is curious about the English activities, they are usually a bit hesitant to participate.  I assure the mothers that it often takes a child a couple weeks to explore the playroom and all the toys before finally becoming completely comfortable in circle time, group activities, and table projects with the other kids.  However, the mothers don't mind, seeming to relish in the time with other young mothers and watching their child explore the new space.  One new mother was so excited about the class she said to another mother, "I can see why you come each week!  This is so fun - these activities are wonderful, even for me!"  Looking to her young son, she asked, "Do you want to come back?"  The son nodded, and the mother looked to me and said, "That's good, but I would come even if I didn't have a child to bring!"  At the end of the lesson, the mothers were helping me clean up the table, and one child hadn't finished his project as he had become distracted with toys and didn't return later to finish.  I passed the materials to his mother saying, "In case he will want to finish it at home."  The mother smiled and said, "I actually really like it when my son doesn't finish; then it becomes my "anti-stress mommy time" after the kids go to bed in the evening!"  

Making Mountain Pictures

Matching Hats to the Outlines

Coffee Filters make great indoor "snow"!

Creating a Winter Window

The Littles often climb into my lap for Circle Time

My prayer is that when I die, all of hell rejoices that I am out of the fight.  - C.S. Lewis

As we started the New Year, the leaders at Connect Club and I decided we would start a new theme about the Life of Jesus through Easter.  Since the girls spent the weeks in December studying Jesus' birth, it seemed ideal to continue with Jesus' life and we dove into the story of Jesus "lost" in the temple.  The girls really enjoyed this story of when Jesus was their age.  We talked about how Mary and Joseph must have felt upon realizing they had left Jesus in Jerusalem and shared personal stories of a times we also were lost.  We focused then on Luke 2:52 "And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men."  We talked about how this one verse gives us an insight for Jesus' life through his teen and young adult years.  I encouraged the girls to think about this verse and how they want to grow over the next year.  We then wrote letters to ourselves to be opened next year to see how we will grow!

Writing Letters to Themselves

We got new Connect Club bracelets with charms of the Manger and the Cross to represent this new theme of the Life of Jesus.  

Playing a new game of trying to guess who is sitting across from you

 Trying to trick their friend!

Home is the nicest word there is.  - L. I. Wilder

Home Games are my favorite to get to cheer on the kids in their sports and competitions!  The kids invited me to come watch them play in their home volleyball tournament, and I couldn't think of a better way to spend a good part of my Saturday.  With both the girls and boys teams playing in the competition, I jumped from court to court and cheered for the teams - on both teams I knew about half the players.  In between matches, a few of the kids I know from ELIM club came over and asked if I wanted to pass the ball around a bit with them.  I loved that even though they have all their friends from the team there, these club kids still wanted to make sure I was included in their fun between matches.