Week Two Education Team!!!!!!!!!!!

I would like to begin by saying thank you to all of you that have supported us and have been faithfully praying for us! I would ask you to continue to do so as our team enters the last full week of our time here in Uganda. My name is Rachel Williams, and I will be giving you an update on the education team. This past week, the education team worked at Masese Co Primary School which is located on a hill in Jinja, Uganda that overlooks the city and Lake Victoria. The location was beautiful. Each JBU student teacher was assigned a Ugandan teacher and class for the week. The transition to this school was more difficult than we expected. The welcome we received was less enthusiastic than the welcome we received at Bolawoli Primary School; however, we eventually made good connections with our teachers. At the end of the week, we even received African names (mine is Muwanika in case you were wondering). The facilities at this school were pretty decent although many of the students came from an extremely poor area located at the bottom of the hill. An outside organization fed the students from the school and the children from the community at breakfast and lunch time everyday. It was a blessing for these students to be able to have two guaranteed meals every school day!

 We thoroughly enjoyed our interactions with the students and staff throughout the week. Thankfully, both our team and the Ugandans were able to understand accents more clearly due to the school being located in the city. Something that many members of our education have been dealing with is the lasting impact of our time here in the schools. The students here learn predominantly through direct instruction and through the repetition of facts given to them. Little critical or higher level thinking has taken place in the classrooms in which we have been placed. Our team has struggled with how to help this situation since the Ugandan educators would need to make adjustments in their educational practices for lasting changes to occur.

We have truly enjoyed spending time with the students and teachers! We have had the opportunity to teach the students, get to know them, and partake in fun activities such as singing and playing games with them. The school even created a program filled with singing and dancing to present to us on the day of our departure from the school. Just simply seeing the smile on a child's face that we are interacting with can make our whole day! I would ask that you would pray for us to have strength as we begin teaching at a new school this week. Please pray that we would be the hands and feet of Christ to all that we come in contact with.

Blessings,
Rachel Williams