I was glad to be teaching again today. The verse of the day - "Set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth" - reminded us that learning about math should never be more important than loving and learning about God. My fifth grade classes are doing really well. I was looking through pictures of them from last year and they have grown a lot. Physically, some of them are taller than me (I'm just glad they have to sit at their desks while I stand at the board); mentally, I see them diving deeper into concepts, asking better questions; and behaviorally, they are much more mature, responding to discipline and following instruction. In 6th grade we had a test, so we will talk about the verse of the day tomorrow. The test was identical to the quiz, so most of the students did really well. Disappointingly, 6A hadn't studied as much, so it took them longer to finish.
After school I went to the corner market for groceries then graded tests. Hannah made chicken curry and rice for dinner. My Skype call was canceled, so I ended up spending some time looking through my old pictures. I watched a couple video clips of Eithen when he was a baby - his first time rolling over, his first word "Sissy," lots of giggles, and his first belly scoot across the floor. While it made me miss him, the videos reminded me how thankful I am that the boys are in our lives now. God was very good to send me Eithen at a time when I needed him most, and when he needed me too.
Later in the evening, one of Hannah's students brought each of us a pizza and coke. She is a sweet student (I got to know her last year during the football clinic); she is always doing things to make us feel welcome here.
Monday, April 8th:
Another warm, sunny day (in the 80s according to Accuweather)! Fifth grade took their test today. 5B did fairly well, but I caught several students in 5A cheating. I'm not sure what happened - if they forgot to study and decided that morning that it would easier to cheat or if they always cheat and I happened to see more of it today. I was disappointed since the test wasn't very difficult and I always give them plenty of help.
Sixth grade enjoys talking about the verse of the day. We talked about the things on earth that we love - our families, food, ourselves, sleep, food, Facebook, friends, food (the boys kept bringing that one up). Math isn't necessarily "things above" but we discussed that we should learn math in order to set our minds and hearts on things above - things about God, heaven and eternity.
As I was writing up "hurts" and "helps" in 6B, one of the students turned on his classmate, yelling at him for "hurting" their row. Another student jumped in (faster than I could), "don't get angry with him, remember, 'love covers all sin.'" I was surprised and thankful at the same time.
6B enjoys writing in their math journals. Today they wrote about, "If I were one inch tall." Some of the students incorporated their understanding of math into the entry - "I would get twelve friends and then we would be one foot tall." But even if their entries are purely imaginary, I know they are starting to associate math with something enjoyable. Two students even told me after class, "Math is actually getting interesting" and "I'm start to like math ... well, at least a little."
6A was pretty talkative today. Usually they settle right in to listen to the lesson, but perhaps with the holiday coming up tomorrow it was a little harder to concentrate. After their class, I took my Snickers to the "garden" and watched my fifth graders play each other in a game "football" (soccer). I talked with teachers and enjoyed my 45 minutes (grading-less) until Hannah finished her last class. We walked home together, and sat down for some leftover pizza. We talked about college and our pre-Kurdistan lives. It is amazing to see how God providentially arranges events to bring people from around the world to a place like this.
I graded tests before we went over to John and Mary's for team time. John had us read through Colossians 3:1 - 4:5 and answer some questions. Ironically (providentially?) my question was, "is there a verse to memorize?" I had just given my students Colossians 3:2 to memorize. I was reminded how little I think of heaven and eternity (things above), which if we love, we ought to spend more time dwelling on. Andy answered the question, "Is there is a condition to be met?" And I was encouraged by the answer - to be "risen with Christ" and to be "the chosen of God." It was a good reminder that this is the only condition separating us from the world. It is nothing I've earned or deserve; it is the only way I am able to mortify the earthly things and put on meekness, kindness, humility, etc. Only after this condition is met can I "set my affections on things above and not on things on the earth." In light of this, we can ask for "doors to be opened" (Hannah's question, "Is there a prayer to repeat?") not among those who are deserving or knowledgeable or skilled, but among those who are chosen, those that He came for - the sick and the needy (and in my case, the cheaters and liars of 5A).
After team time we went to a new-to-us restaurant called Urfa Sofras, a Turkish style restaurant. The food was really good ... I even had a bite of steak! After we got home and Henry was in bed, Hannah and I went over to John and Mary's for a movie.
