Friday, April 22, 2011

Teacher's Corner

Although Iskashitaa is best known for produce redistribution and sewing programs, there is a lot of wonderful work going on in the English Classes as well! Below are a few entries from the English teaching Intern's weekly blog.

In the classes at Las Casitas, Danny and I went over a sizing lesson on Monday that seemed to be very beneficial. Though we had no students the week after Spring Break, there now seems to be a normal crowd of about 5-6 students. On Wednesday of last week, we made our first trip to the library on 22nd street with four students. We spent the entire time filling out applications for library cards and explaining how the library works. The librarians were extremely helpful and found all kinds of books for us. They were even nice enough to give us two copies of the New Oxford Picture Dictionary and forms written in Nepali. We checked out a couple books and simultaneously caused confusion by not checking out the dictionaries that were gifts.

The Oasis Classes ran an extra curricular adventure on Saturday. 5 students (Camille and Amanda included) from Camp Wildcat went to Oasis Apartments and rounded up about 15 kids to go to the park and play. We played basketball, soccer, and frisbee. There was also much hula hooping and screaming "take my picture-- take my picture!" (I brought a camera and didn't realize how photogenic these kids were going to be! It was nuts!) After more than 2 hours and lots of water breaks, we headed back to the apartments where more pictures were taken. All the kids were awesome, but one boy in particular was especially adorable. I think he was the youngest-- maybe 5 or 6 years old. But he made the cutest noises, wanted to carry the hula hoops and made us let him hold onto a tree and watch him jump down from it without blinking. It was awesome. Overall, I think everyone had a great time.

To learn more about what Iskashitaa's Honors Civic Engagement Team is doing, check out their weekly blog. Please contact Kathy if you are interested in volunteering with English classes or donating children's books and teaching manuals.

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