No Power

    Just as the past few days, I headed up to the Comedor after getting ready and drinking my "proffee" to sit with the toddlers, and then we walked back to their house.  As we came up on their house, I saw that same creature on the wall that I took a picture of yesterday.  All of the toddlers wanted me to take another picture, and told me to be careful because it was dangerous.  Since I had already gotten a picture yesterday, I just decided to leave it be this morning.  I sat with the toddlers in the Sala where the movie clip we watched was Coco.  When it was time to take them to school, we all walked together and Dunia (the lady in charge of the toddlers) let me know that they were making chicken burritos to sell today and asked me if I wanted any because they sell out fast...so I ordered two, one for me and one for Noah.

   We got to school and I made sure that they lined up and got to their classrooms before heading to the high school to talk to the director about helping any kids who didn't pass their first trimester final exams.  They have one shot on a retake to pass or they'd need to repeat their grade.  Today is the last day of final exams, but I'm not sure there were any math tests going on today.  He said to come back at recess and chat with the 2 math teachers and we could put something together.  So in the meantime, I headed back to the house and continued to work on the lessons/units that the teachers gave me when I first arrived.  I got all of the lessons made for the polygons/circles unit, whether I teach it next week or leave it behind for the teachers to pick up where I left off.

   At some point during the morning, the electricity went out, so the fans in the house all slowed down to eventually turning off.  I have mentioned in many prior blogs posts that this is quite common, although it's the first time it has happened on this trip.  Noah messaged me to say that the burritos were done and at the Tienda, and asked if one of the two was his...to which I said yes.  He was quite focused on finding a flash drive that he had lost this morning but didn't know where he lost it, so was retracing his steps throughout the morning.  The flash drive had quite a few movies on it for the small girls house, so it's not something he really wanted to lose.  I headed down to the tienda to grab my burrito, but left the 2nd one there for Noah to pick up when he got hungry.  Instead of eating the burrito there, I came back to the house to eat it while working through lessons.  I prepped all morning.

My chicken burrito next to all of the materials I was working on

   During recess, I headed down to the school to chat with Profe Dayana and Profe Jorge and let them know that I was available all afternoon and after supper for any students who wanted help, but the students would have to let me know they needed help and they would have to tell me what house they lived in as well as what grade they were in, so I knew exactly what I needed to bring where.  After talking to them, I walked over to the elementary school side to find Raleigh to let him know the same.  Raleigh asked if I could make myself available after lunch for the 10th and 11th grade to work with them in the school...I said sure.

   Lunch consisted of rice, veggies and 2 tortillas.  After lunch, I gathered up my materials from the house and headed down to the school to work with the 10th and 11th graders who needed some review before the retake test.  I asked them what they wanted to review and they said the entire trimester.  So I had to let them know that going through the entire trimester in 2 hours for 2 separate grades was impossible.  They needed to think of what was on their exam and what type of questions/material they struggled with, and then find it in the book and show me.  So they spent a bit of time and the 11th grade settled on factorials, permutations and combinations (which is a rather tough subject).  The 10th grade settled on trigonometry and a little bit of vectors.  We worked the entire 2 hours and the 3 students from each grade took lots of notes.  We arranged to work at the same time tomorrow as well.

   I went to put my items away and saw the small girls with Elsa in the yard next to the Girls Volunteer House, so stopped by to check in whether there were any bigger girls from her house that needed to retake the test and whether they wanted to review.  She said "no" but wanted to chat with me for a bit.  So we chatted and then I headed up to put my books and materials away, and grabbed some water flavor packets for Elsa and a chili-coated Mexican sucker for her and each big girl in charge of the small girls.  We all headed to supper and had rice, beans and a tortilla and then I headed back to the house for the night.  The power did come back on just before going to bed.

A Day of Cleaning

    After getting ready for the morning, I headed to the Comedor to walk the toddlers back to their house (where they wait for school in the sala with a movie).  Outside their house was a strange bug that I took a picture of...the girls seemed to be really scared of it and said it bites hard!  I am not quite sure what it is, but thought it was quite the interesting creature, worthy of a picture.

   Today's movie was Spirit, and honestly that is a movie I have never seen before in its entirety.  Unfortunately for me, we were only there for 40 minutes, so that is what I got to see of the movie...the first 40 minutes.  We headed to school and Brithany and Sara took my hand all the way to school, chatting with me along the way.  Last year Sara really didn't talk too much, but this year she is cuter than ever, using her words to the best of her ability.

   When the elementary school kids get to school, they have to line up just like the high school kids do.  This morning, they sand the national anthem, then another song (not sure what it was), then recited a passage (again, not sure what it was...a pledge of some sort?) before they were able to get called to their classrooms.  When the courtyard cleared of all of the children because they were finally in their classrooms, I headed back to the Girls Volunteer House.  Anna and Olivia had been up most of the night packing, til the wee hours of the morning, yet another demonstration to of how different humans can be as I typically prefer packing the day before and only keeping out the essentials that I will need the next morning to get ready for the day.  They were out and about saying their goodbyes throughout the morning, and Noah was walking around with the girls and John.  Luis (the "Uber" driver) was waiting up by our house to pick up all 3 volunteers to take them back to the airport, so after the goodbyes, away they went.  And thus began my morning of cleaning.

   I washed the last of Anna and Olivia's breakfast dishes, then swept and mopped the bathroom, long hall, dining room, living room, and kitchen area.  Because of all of the arm motions involved, my Fitbit said I had 10,000 steps by lunch time!  I don't think I had that many "steps" however I did work up quite the sweat this morning because there was a LOT of area to cover in this house.  Around 11am, I headed to the Tienda, but saw Graciela sitting outside the old big girls Comedor (when each house had their own Comedor), her girls were making tortillas.  We sat for about a half an hour chatting and the girls brought me a tortilla filled with beans, eggs and cream (almost like a sour cream).  It was delicious.  Then I headed to the Comedor to eat, where we were served beans, potatoes and a tortilla.  

   After lunch I spent an hour with the small girls in the yard and gave Nora a plastic gun that blows bubbles to use with them (I bought 3 from the Dollar Tree back home), but then got back to cleaning the house, scrubbing down all 3 sinks in the bathroom, finishing up the laundry (bedding) that Anna and Olivia had thrown in the washer, folding it and putting it away, and wiping down the kitchen table and cupboards.  It made for a long day, but it was so well worth it to have a house that actually FELT clean.  With open windows and doors all day, stuff gets tracked in and along with the dust, it accumulates.  So it's nice to be able to spend one day a week doing a deeper clean.

   With the entire house mostly clean, I headed to supper and had some good chats with Oscar.  He had asked for more lemonade packets that I had brought down, so I took him another container.  When in town last weekend, I had bought most of the ingredients to make the kitchen crew guacamole, but unfortunately I wasn't able to find avocados or cilantro.  So at supper, I let Noah know that if he made a casual run into town this week (because it seems he goes more than the "average" volunteer, due to working in the wood shop with maestro and needed unplanned for items), he should try to look for those 2 things.  I am hoping to get a huge batch made within my next 2 weeks here for the kitchen crew because I know they look forward to that each year.  And it is my way to say thank you for the meals that they have prepared me.

   Yep, I said it...2 weeks left.  It hit me today that 2 weeks from today will be my last full day here.  I really want to be able to fully appreciate that and take in everything with an open heart because since 2008, this trip has been filling my bucket and I am hoping that continues at least as many years into the future.

S'mores with the Small Girls

    This morning when we went to church, Dunia was giving the message.  She has such a passion for the Lord and this showed as soon as she began her message in prayer.  Noah sat next to me, as did Nora.  I tend to sit in the very last row since I am so tall and I don't want anyone who might be behind me to not be able to see due to my height.

   After church, Nora and I went back to the Girls Volunteer House to do just a little bit of cleaning, sweeping and taking the garbage out.  Sundays are our "free days" and typically volunteers use it to do a full cleaning of their house, however since Anna and Olivia are leaving tomorrow morning and would be packing quite a bit today, I wasn't sure that cleaning today would be a good idea because with all the movement and packing, it may get easily dirty throughout the day...so I will take care of cleaning little by little throughout the week.

   I filled my water bottle with water and added and acai/blueberry as well as a strawberry/kiwi water packet to the water bottle and made my way down to the Comedor.  Some of the little boys asked what I had in the water bottle today, since I bring down an array of different flavors to help me stay a bit more hydrated (I am not a fan of room temperature plain water), and I let them know what this afternoon's flavor was.  A few asked if they could try it, so when they were done with the water that was already in their cups, I poured each of them a little bit to try.  They all loved it.  I went home with none left, but that's alright because I brought down enough packets to last me for the trip and then some.

   Nora and I made out way back to the Volunteer House and we chatted for a bit.  She wanted to take Jonathan to the store.  Jonathan is a special boy of Sarah's, who was a long term volunteer here with Morgan until just before COVID hit.  We decided to wait an hour or two, to let Anna and Olivia celebrate a birthday at the store with some of the small girls and Noah.  Since Norah and I will be here a few more weeks (and she stays even longer than I do), we were okay with using Sunday mainly for rest.  When we finally did walk down to the store, I accidentally passed by the Grandecitas House and forgot to check in on Genesis to see if I could take her to the store.  She had been asking all week and I said perhaps on Sunday.  By the time I got to the store, Nora reminded me about Genesis and thankfully Karen (the one who is in charge of the Grandecitas) was at the store.  So I asked her and it just seemed like perhaps next Sunday might be better, due to behaviors.  Karen was celebrating her little brother, Jeremias, birthday.  They had a huge chocolate cake with chocolate frosting and Karen's daughter were dressed up really nice...most likely still from church.  They were all really happy to be spending time together.  Nora went to get Jonathan and bought him a water and pack of cookies, which they call bread.  He was enjoying himself the entire time he was in the store.

   I headed to the Comedor and helped Oscar set up plates and put the table cloths over the plates to cover the food from flies and keep it warm for longer.  Tonight's menu consisted of beans, rice, a cream to mix in and a tortilla.  After supper, I walked up to the Volunteer House to change because Noah had a special night planned for the small girls.

   Since Noah couldn't do s'mores with the small girls last night due to rain, he was waiting for me on the other side of the gymnasium to get the events started.  The small girls were up in their house taking baths, and he had a table set out and went to get the supplies that he had purchased over the weekend.  Raleigh was going to start the fire, and was in the gym with his medium boys, but came out to tell Noah that Noah could do it.  So I told the girls to gather the dry leaves, dry pine needles, and small pine sticks and little by little we got that fire going.  Noah had bought 3 super long metal rods a while back and cut them down in the wood shop and attached wooden handles to them.  Maestro and Pandi helped him round the edges of the handles and whatnot, and together they made 21 very long roasting sticks to be used for quite a while after tonight!  Noah gave a hat to the birthday girl and then they started roasting their marshmallows with Anna, Olivia and Noah helping them to build the s'mores when they took their "burnt" marshmallows back to the table of supplies.  I just kept the fire going.  It was a good night for all.

Noah giving the birthday girl her hat, said her eyes had to be closed

   It was going to be a long night for Anna and Olivia since they hadn't yet started packing and they will leave early tomorrow morning.  They came back to the house from the Small Girls House well after Nora and I went to sleep, and I woke once to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and they were still up packing, with suitcase zippers opening and closing quite a bit.

17,000 Steps

   After waking and getting ready this morning, I decided to head down to the Comedor.  There was no school today and cleaning our house generally takes place on Sunday, so I thought I would walk the toddlers back to their house (the Chosa) at 6am, and sit with them for the morning.  We watched an animated Batman series as well as watching the Curious George movie.  Around 9:30am, I made a trip back to the Girls Volunteer House to fill up my water and go to the bathroom.  When I got back, Dunia let us know that we were going to take the toddlers out to the farm because 2 new horses arrived yesterday.  When we got to the horse barn, Andy was there to welcome us and tell us a little bit about the 2 new horses, that were a little malnourished and only 3 years old.  They will definitely get good care here and will be healthy soon enough!  Our time at the horse barn wasn't as long as was originally hoped, so we walked over to the greenhouse for the toddlers to see the squash and cantaloupe and corn.  With an hour left before lunch, at this point we walked all the way back to the Toddler House and spent time in the sala watching a movie.  The sun was really strong this morning, which continued through the afternoon, leaving me with a very light burn that would most likely be gone by tomorrow.

   After lunch, I went into town with Noah, John, and Nora.  Nora needed to do some grocery shopping and had never been in town before as she's always come down on teams.  I needed to get some toilet paper for our bathroom, then also decided to get some bananas, green grapes, supplies to make guacamole at some point for the cooks in the kitchen, and then a lot of Zuko for the family back home.  John offered to carry one of my bags back and Noah carried the other.  As we passed Matilda's (where we typically get the frozen chocolate covered bananas), John realized he had forgotten to get something in town.  Noah wasn't too happy because he had just bought 30 Hershey's chocolate bars (which were in his black backpack) and the sun was strong.  So I suggested that Nora and I go into Matilda's (which is air conditioned) while the boys go back into town to get what John missed.  That way the chocolate candy bars could stay in Matilda's store and not melt, and Nora could try a frozen chocolate covered banana, WIN-WIN.  When the boys got back to the store, they each bought a frozen chocolate banana and we continued our walk back to Emmanuel, stopping at Glenda's on the way back and saying "hi".  We chatted for a bit and I bought onions from her before we headed back to Emmanuel.  

   Nora and I put our groceries away and chatted for a bit before heading down to the Comedor to eat supper.  They served eggs, refried beans, ketchup (for flavoring) and tortillas.  Noah wanted to do smores with the the Small Girls House, but that was the time it started to rain.  And it rained hard for the rest of the night...so smores would have to hold off.  About 5pm, I went to my room and settled in for the night, my Fitbit said I had gotten over 17,000 steps today which makes sense with the trip way out to the horse barn and then into town.  I was beat, and the Fitbit also reported out that I was fast asleep by 6:04pm.

Judging a Science Fair

    This morning "Circle" was held in the Comedor.  With all of the rains, I am guessing this will become a bit more common.  Felipe talked about who God is, and when he posed the question a child came forward to answer that He is the Creator of the universe.  Felipe said that was good, but that God was so much more!  So he continued to ask who God is.  When no other children wanted to answer, Dunia volunteered and recited verses she knew where God said He is the Alpha and Omega, Beginning and the End, and continued on with a more in depth description of who God is so that all could absorb His Being.  After the lesson, Andi played the guitar and led the orphanage in praises to God.

The Big Girls reciting their verses (David - "Papi" is in blue)

   After breakfast, I walked with the toddlers to their house to spend time with them before school started.  We were in the sala and the TV was on as we waited.  Brithany came over to sit next to me and a few others came and left, so we enjoyed taking a few pictures together before heading to the school.  The 10th graders have their big math test today, so I will be interested to find how how they did.

Mateo, Camila and Me

Mateo, Brithany (tongue out), Abi and Me

   When the toddlers were all situated in school, I headed back to the Girls Volunteer House, but met Graciela along the way.  She told me that she was frustrated with the girls in the house she is in charge of...the big girls.  That last night, the tia kept calling her because the girls would not settle down and they were throwing things, even their sandals to the point that they had broken just about all of the light bulbs on the first floor of their house.  They are constantly misbehaving, and she is at a loss about what to do because there are limitations on punishment (jsut like there are limitations in the States with foster children).  Honestly in the moment, I didn't have any ideas for her and I could only listen...but I did tell her that if I could help her in any way, she just needed to let me know.  Little did I know in the moment that she would take me up on that offer later in the day.

   I saw that Noah was over at the hotel working again, so since I didn't get pictures yesterday, I decided to head over to get pictures so that those who are interested in seeing Emmanuel's "hotel accommodations" could get a glimpse on the construction progress.

Coming into the hotel

One of the bigger hotel rooms

Bathroom under construction

Bathroom under construction

A smaller hotel room

Living room area of the hotel

Dining area of the hotel

   I decided to get more steps in and walk the "long way" back to the Volunteer House, and I saw some decorations down at the elementary school on my way, so I decided to stop in.  They were having a science fair.  Nora was there (she spends the day in the elementary school helping out the teachers in any way she can since she is going into early childhood education).  We chatted for a bit and then Raleigh came out and asked me if I would like to be a judge for the science fair...I was pretty excited to oblige!  I was given an official folder as well as a scoring sheet to work through as I saw each experiment being presented.  There was a group from each grade (1-6) that participated with their experiment in the science fair.  They had to introduce us to the members of their group, to their experiment, tell us the materials they needed, and then report the process as well as carry it out.  Each group had a poster with all of this information on it.  The first group to judge was 1st through 3rd grade, and the interesting part was that the 3 of us judges (Raleigh, the kindergarten teacher and I) had all picked a different grade to win, so we added our total points and the 2nd grade class ended up being the overall winners.  For the 4th through 6th grade competition, the 3 of us judges were unanimous in picking the 6th graders as the winning science fair experiment.  At the end of the science fair, we were presented with official judging certificates!

Elementary School Science Fair

My official judging folder

Judging scoring sheet

The elementary school children waiting for the science fair presentations

2nd grade - winners of lower elementary school fair (Raleigh is in black to the right)

Poster and presentation for 5th grade

5th grade experiment

6th grade experiment (Lava Lamp)

My judging certificate

   While in the Comedor for lunch, Graciela came over to ask me to do the Ensenanza (Bible study) this afternoon for the big girls.  I knew she was stressed and she said that if she were to do it, her anger might come through in the lesson and that would definitely not be a good way to go through Ensenanza.  I let her know I'd be happy to prepare a lesson for the girls, so I spent the afternoon working through a lesson on obedience and self-control.  I had the girls read the following verses:  Eph.6:1, Col.3:20, Ex.20:12, John 14:23, Lev.18:4 and 2 John 1:8.  We talked about Martin Luther's 
"What Does This Mean?" to the commandment "Honor thy father and mother so that it shall go well with you", which is "We should fear and love God, so that we do not despise our parents or superiors (others in authority), nor provoke them to anger, but honor, serve, obey love and esteem them."  That Graciela is doing all that God charges her with...working hard to raise the girls in this Big Girl House in the ways of God, and they are called to honor that.  We talked about decisions, that the girls being teenagers are at the point where they are wanting to make their own decisions and know the difference between good and bad...meaning they will have to either reap the benefits or the consequences of their decisions/actions.  And as parents, we have to give out the consequences or the rewards to various decisions our children make.  To encourage positive behavior, at the very end of the lesson, I gave Graciela a bag of the Mexican chili-coated suckers in front of the girls.  And I told the girls that this can be ONE reward that Graciela gives out, perhaps only one at a time, probably not any time soon...but as time goes on as she sees good decisions being made.  Maybe they don't get one today, or tomorrow.  Maybe it takes 8 months.  Maybe in that time Graciela eats them all herself.  That would be completely up to the girls and the decisions they make.

   These suckers are something the kids have come to know over time.  I began bringing them down in 2008 and have brought them down every year since.  You cannot get them down here.  The kids enjoy them so much that as my own kids came down, I turned handing them out over to my kids.  The only place where I give suckers out is in the school as prizes for games we play every once in a while.  So Graciela having an entire bag of 40 suckers (I only brought 3 bags down this trip) is a BIG DEAL.  Will the girls from her house get them?  Will she give them out to others?  Who knows?  Only time will tell.

   When it was time for supper, I went back to the house to grab the socks and underwear and bras I had brought down for the grandecitas, grandecitos, and pequenos houses.  I turned them over to the ones in charge of that house to distribute as needed.  Orphanage Emmanuel has their own website...they have had an online presence since before I began coming in 2008.  And always on their "We need" list, is undergarments and socks.  Sometimes that can be an "after thought" for many who send down clothes, so there is always a shortage.  Feel free to head to their website to see a list of needs if you are thinking of sending things down on a container.  If you are not quite sure how to donate, ask me and I can get you hooked up!  

Typical meal at Emmanuel in the Comedor

   After supper, Anna and Olivia headed to the Small Girls House to do a sleepover.  Their days are winding down (headed back on Monday), so they want to make the most of each day and night.  And I used the time to chat with Nora for about an hour before we both turned in for the night.

Rain - ALL DAY LONG

    This morning I went to the school to find out that students would be testing today through Tuesday of next week.  This means I didn't have to teach my lessons today and could use the day to get caught up, especially with the upcoming 8th grade lesson on dividing polynomials.  I had looked at this lesson earlier and the way that division is done in Honduras is definitely a different formatting than we use in the United States, so I knew that I would need some uninterrupted time to be able to figure out what they were doing, in order to mimic that process as well as give extra examples to the kids so they understand better.  Math has always been a challenge down here, but I know that each year I come...the students are excited I am here because I give them quite a few extra examples that we can practice together as well as for them to practice on their own.  So I headed back up to the house to begin taking a look at polynomial division.

    So I worked throughout the morning and afternoon on wrapping up polynomial multiplication and division.  Today it rained all day...quite literally all day.  So it was a nice day to stay in and get these notes done.  I had 12 "formal" pages of teaching and practice for polynomial division.  It sounds like a lot, but each problem does take up a lot of space.  Of course as I worked through these pages, I needed breaks here and there, so every hour or so I would find something to do around the Girls Volunteer House, from sweeping the kitchen, dining room and living room, to cleaning all 5 bathroom mirrors (it is a large bathroom with 3 stalls, 3 sinks and 3 showers), to washing and drying my laundry.  

   I took a temporary polynomial division break for lunch, and in the Comedor I asked Noah if he was heading back to his house before going back to the woodshop.  Since he said yes, I told him to stop by the Girls Volunteer House to pick up the sports uniforms, warm up shirts, and hoodies I had brought down here that our kids have now outgrown.  Since these items have our last name on them, donating them to Goodwill or another thrift store back in the States doesn't really make sense...so we have been bringing them down here for the children to wear and they definitely wear them with pride, especially since they personally know the athlete that it originally belonged to was!  I figured since Noah has been down here since February, he would want to hand them out to some children he has made good connections with.  We don't have many of these clothing items left back at home because the 2 kiddos left in the house don't really play sports where they would have constant access to this type of clothing that would have their names on the back.  There was a hoodie and volleyball shirt that I had brought to the Comedor to give to Julissa and Oscar for all the work they do feeding everyone here at Emmanuel.

   In the afternoon, I worked some more on the lessons as it rained.  On one of my "breaks" from lesson planning, I put my clothes away that just finished up in the dryer.  When I looked out my bedroom window, I could see that Noah was working at the new hotel (used to be the small girls house).  I may have mentioned in my spring blog that the hotel they had for years was turned into offices.  Noah told me that it was government offices (think along the line of our "Child and Protective Services" in the States).  So the plan was to take the "U-shaped" old small girls house and turn that into their new hotel.  They would get 5 hotel rooms out of this, as well as a large kitchen area, a large dining area and a large living/family room area.  I decided to walk over there since it was just "drizzling" at this point, and check out the progress.  Noah saw me and decided to show me around.  The rooms are very nice, already painted and with future in them (queen bed as well as some chairs and a table).  The living room area has 3 leather couches that Noah said electrically recline.  He also said they will be getting a TV to mount on the wall in that room.  There is a bathroom in the living room area as well, so you don't have to go all the way back to your bedroom to use the bathroom should you need it.  The kitchen was locked, so I didn't get to see it, but John told me that they had covered the brick walls with paneling and that it looked very nice.  The dining room is open to the courtyard and has 2 large dining room tables, one is brand new!  I asked Noah if they were planning to close off the dining room so nobody would come to steal the tables or chairs in the middle of the night, but he said not that he didn't believe they would be closing it off.  I am excited to have the opportunity to stay at the hotel in future trips here.

   Before supper, I headed to the tienda...mainly just to have good conversation with those that were there.  Noah stopped by, Milton was there, Lydia stopped by and asked who was hosting the "party" at the tienda.  Although I wasn't really planning on buying anything, I ended up getting a package of red Chokis (similar to Chips Ahoy cookies), and a bag of Cheetos.  Since Invisible (Pamela) was there, I bought her a bag of Cheetos as well.  I took these items to the Comedor with me as I had no intention of eating all 6 Chokis myself, not because I couldn't but more because I didn't was to start up my system of wanting chocolate on a daily basis like my kids would do each year they were here (they are addicted to Chokis, LOL).  In the Comedor, I gave a Choki to Oscar, one to Julissa, and two to Juan Carlos.  When Josecito saw me eat the remaining two, he said "I thought you were on a diet!"  I looked at him, then looked at the bag of Cheetos, and decided it would be best for me not to eat the bag of Cheetos...so I gave it to him.

   When I came back to the house from supper, I got into my pajamas, did a few things around the house and pretty much went to bed about 6pm because I was tired, probably from all the rain today (and it was STILL raining).

My Struggle with Translation

    This morning I swept the bathroom (again).  With white ceramic tile floors throughout the house, they floors tend to show absolutely everything that is on them (dirt, grass, bugs, hair, etc) very easily.  When I had lived in Mexico, it was the same.  Most Mexicans would sweep multiple times during the day and mop daily.  Many of us in the United States are not used to this kind of "culture", so we either live in filth (yuck) or we find "work-arounds".  My work-around that I used in Mexico and also continued to use ever since coming here in 2008 was to put a towel at each entrance.  When we entered, we would immediately take off our shoes and put them on the towel so as not to track mud/dirt/grass throughout the house.  If food spilled on the floor, it was picked up immediately and wiped down with a damp cloth so as not to attract bugs.  As the girls brushed their hair, they were supposed to collect it in their brush/comb and empty it directly into the garbage.  All of these little things added up to not having to mop on the daily.  When we were in the hotel, because it was such a small space, I still pretty much swept daily, but we could mop just about weekly.  Because I am not living with my kids this summer, I have to be a little more flexible with a little more grace to those that are not used to this kind of culture/environment.  It's okay. They leave the house each morning at 5am because of their house responsibilities.  I am mostly in the house that early in the morning due to prepping for the math classes, and I do need breaks from time to time, to process what I have just planned, and what still needs to be planned.  So sweeping is a nice break.

   The 10th grade math class began at 7am this morning.  We did review of trigonometry today, reviewing SOH CAH TOA (which I had taught them back in April and they have been using), the other 3 trigonometric functions (cosecant, secant, cotangent), angles in the cartesian plane as well as their reference angles, and converting angles to radians and vice versa.  Profe Jorge told me that their exam will be Friday and today was the last day of math until Friday.  Before leaving the 10th grade classroom, I left all of my notes from Monday and today with Profe Jorge, since a part of the overall course grade is their note-taking in class.

   After the 10th grade math class, I had a little bit of a break, so I headed back to the house, debating whether to tackle upcoming lessons or translate a note from Josecito that he had given me on Monday.  I believe he wrote it for a person who is on the team, so it would need to be translated fairly soon, before that person heads back to the United States.  I settled on translating the note.  What I didn't realize (because I hadn't read it back when he gave it to me) was that it was a song.  And since I am not a musician, this was going to be difficult for me.  The song was very beautifully written in Spanish.  Unfortunately, without the gift of being a true musician or poet...it didn't sound nearly as well translated through me to English.  When I walked back to the school and found Josecito, I gave him both his version and the translation and told him...never again would I translate a song or any poetry from Spanish to English for him.  Never again.

   After recess was the 8th grade class that I had prepared for.  Just like on Monday, I prepared lessons on multiplying polynomials, however when I got there, the teacher told me that the 8th graders would also have their test on Friday and she needed me to do a review of some of the concepts that would be on the test.  Multiplying polynomials was on the test, so that was okay...but then she needed a review of statistics, specifically histograms, mean, median and mode.  I knew I could do all of that, but the problem with teaching geometry and statistics in Spanish is NOT the fact that it can tend to be more difficult mathematical material, but that I need time to go over some of the key content words in Spanish in order to be more effective in Spanish.  Also, anyone who knows me knows that I do not do well being put on the spot with surprises.  So coming into a classroom with everything planned for the class period, and then to be asked to add in to the lesson something all together different?  It is a total shock to my system.  We got through it though, by the grace of God.

Our histogram with mean, median and mode example

   When the 8th grade class was done, it was the boys turn to clean the classroom (the classroom gets swept and mopped at the end of each day) and then we headed to the Comedor for lunch.  Oscar and the women in the kitchen had prepared spaghetti with vegetables and tortillas.  After eating, I headed to the Baby House to work with Danielle's two 10th grade girls that had requested an extra review for the math test coming up on Friday.  We went into the small chosa that is usually reserved for early childhood education for the 2 and 3 year olds.  Karen used to do this, but her and Mike have since moved back to the United States.  I believe when I left last summer, April took it over...but she too, went back to the U.S. after Christmas and has not been back down since.  We sat at a table on little preschool chairs and worked through different questions the girls had on the 3 topics that would be covered on Friday's test: Trigonometry, Vectors, and Matrices.  When we were done working together, I headed back to the Girls Volunteer House to get ready for supper...we were served rice, beans and tortillas.

   Wednesday nights are church nights.  Patrick (the husband I sat next to when the Team invited Staff and Volunteers to supper earlier this week) gave the sermon and his testimony.  Raleigh translated from the English to Spanish.  After church ended, I chatted with some kids, staff and volunteers outside the church before heading back up to the house, chatting with my friend Cheryl through Facebook Messenger about her mom's surgery that day and the upcoming one tomorrow, and then turning in for the night.