My Littles

I spend about 2 hours every morning walking from hut to hut in Singanga village trying to find my little ones that are learning to read. I absolutely love this part of the day. There's something different about meeting my students where they're at rather than counting on them to come find me every day.

After greeting parents, grandparents, aunties, uncles and whoever else might be around I find a place to sit outside with my kiddos to do a reading lesson. Sometimes it's extremely distracting to be sitting outside when grandmas might try and do the reading for the child or a mom starts yelling over us to her neighbor walking down the road. But there is something I find so beautiful about sitting with them at their home. I learn about their families this way. I see the dynamics of how parents interact, which neighbor kids are always hanging around, which kids are always home alone, and which granny wants to learn to read more than her grandchild.

Even though I can't always communicate well with my students they still understand praise. I love seeing their faces light up when they are able to read a sentence or small paragraph. Watching my students make progress is one of the most rewarding things. Especially after we just got their term 1 reports back and the majority are extremely disappointing. I know that teaching them to read will not disappoint. And whether or not it shows up on their term report, I've been watching them grow and develop into little readers and it's exciting!

Our Michigan church is partnering with us to build a reading room. We have been collecting books stateside and they will be shipped over here sometime later this year. My students are catching a glimpse of what it means to get lost in a book. They love it! And I can't wait until the reading room is up and running. I can't wait to spend hours sitting and reading books.

If you think of it, pray for these small ones. Pray that they would learn to read and that this would empower them. My prayer is that they would not only be growing as readers, but that they would be growing deeper in their relationship with Christ.