Change of pace

This week we started Model School. It has been great so far. I started out the week with a class of 15 8th grade students. On the first day, 6 of them came to class, and 3 of them were over 45 minutes late. But, I guess that is the island way. The first day we just introduced ourselves and came up with class room rules. The second day I started teaching. We had one English class for an hour and a half and one science class for 45 minutes. We start everyday at 8:30 and end class by 11. This gives us one hour to plan lessons for the next day, then we continue on to lunch then 4 hours of language class. I am still learning Yapese, but please don't ask me to say anything because it is very hard and confusing. It is said to be the most difficult of all the islands. I am amazed I have energy to even write at the end of the day. The days are long, but rewarding. My 8th grade students were so smart on the first day. Our writing activity was to have the students write a creative letter to someone they miss. Most of them wrote to their mothers, which I thought was cute. I gave them an example of a letter from my sister (Emily you are famous here). For science we talked about limited resources and the kids blew me away again. They had to come up with ways to conserve limited resources. My favorite was "We can use a machete to cut the grass instead of the lawn mower which uses gas."  Or "We can unplug the refrigerator.... When there is no food in it." Very smart ideas, probable for Pohnpei, but not so much for the United States haha. Needless to say, I fell in love with my students on day one. Then came the curve ball. There were too many 6th grade students, so they needed to break it up into two classes. So all my 8th grade students got split up and put into other 8th grade classes, and we took over the class of 21 6th grade students. I am sure I will fall in love with them as I did with the 8th grade, I just need to get used to them. 

Also, the family car broke down, so I have added a 3 mile walk on to my exercise list every day. Luckily in the morning it is down hill so when I get to class I am not too sweaty. However, in the evening when I get home from school, I am either drenched in sweat from walking or water from the heavy afternoon rain falls, both very uncomfortable. I am just going to take this as an opportunity to eat more cookies, because I know I will be walking them off by the end of the day. My host family is great and the closer I get to moving to Yap, the more I think about how much I will miss them. Well I will write about my 6th graders soon enough, 'till then, hope all is well with you all.