Semillas de Amor: Battle of the Sexes

Update on what is happening at Semillas de Amor from Sheena: 

This week was a battle of the sexes at the foundation! Girls in one group and boys in another, the children quizzed each other on the numbers in English from one to ten. On the boy's side Wilson (10), pictured above, led the review. Each side worked hard with the hope of crushing the other team in a number game. In the end the girls took the win, much to the dismay of the boys.

This week also marked the beginning of our jewelry project here at Seeds of Love. The mothers of the children at the foundation are learning how to make bracelets and necklaces. With limited funds the few women who run the foundation are regularly forced to use their own money to keep things going. Though it is inspiring to see so much generosity coming from families that have very little themselves, it is also troublesome to see them under such financial burden. To help these families and to support the construction of the foundation the jewelry made by the mothers will be available for purchase in December. Just in time for Christmas!

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Semillas de Amor: Construction in Progress!

Update from Sheena at Semillas de Amor:

Good news! Construction has begun on a permanent structure to house the foundation Seeds of Love! Without a permanent structure, children are crammed into the limited patio space afforded them by a friend of the foundation. This is only made more inconvenient by the rain, which falls incessantly during these Winter months. However with a respite in the rain our dedicated handymen have begun preparing the space for construction!

In more good news, the children of the foundation this week learned the alphabet in English. Leadership was practiced by older children as they guided others through pronunciation of each letter. The children then faced a group challenge of tapping the right letter in an alphabet game and team “Hot Dogs” beat team “Hamburgers” five to two!

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Semillas de Amor: The English Race

The following is from Sheena, an intern at Semillas de Amor:

The boys have invaded the English class, and so has grammar! This week the students started working on sentence construction. In pairs they raced to put the words in order to form phrases. I was incredibly proud to see my more experienced students helping newer students. During the last class Silfredo (8), pictured above with arms waving high, was having a lot of trouble putting the sentences in order. This class, with a little repetition and guidance from the others, he was able to not only put the sentence in order, but also give his brother Cristian (15), to the right of Silfredo, a run for his money during the racing game. He's become a lot more confident in the process and when I see him outside of class he's always ready to ask, "What is your name?"

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Semillas de Amor: Dreams and English

Entry by Sheena, an intern at Semillas de Amor: 

Many of the local girls here in Turbaco, Colombia have great aspirations to be chefs of international cuisine, doctors, and everything inbetween. Wendy (17), second from left, wants to be a nurse and Yuriko (10), third from left, wants to be a doctor. English is emphasized in school and at the local public university in Cartagena. In order to graduate from the university they have to pass a rigorous English test. Desipte this, many of the girls have a hard time with pronunciation and speaking and many do not know the alphabet from memory. We´re practicing as a group and the girls are already showing great progress.

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Iltaqui: Spotlight on Andres

Claryssa, an intern at Iltaqui, gives us a spotlight on Andres:

The classes are going great! The students can now have a basic conversation in English including phrases like "My name is", "I am from", "I am _ years old". They are catching on quickly and love to practice with their partners.

Luis Andres Panama is pictured above. Andres is an AMAZING student who loves learning English! He is very bright and continues to surprise me every day. Andres is 11 years old and has a twin brother whose name is Luis Angel and a younger brother whose name is Abelardo. The three of them have not missed a day of classes! Andres comes to class everyday with a smile and full of enthusiasm. He has an excellent memory and can recall almost every vocabulary word the students have learned without looking at his notes. I can't say enough about Andres. Not only is he an excellent student but also an amazing soccer player and artist. If he were given the opportunity to continue studying English, I am positive that he would master the language in no time at all!

How to help a child like Andres.

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New Project for Interns (Cynthia)

April 5 update from Cynthia, an intern at El Bichito:

One of the best parts of working here in Peru is that we are always finding or creating new projects, which means that as interns we get to learn something new, get to know new people and challenge ourselves. One such opportunity came up as we offered our services to the local elementary school here in Pulyucana. None of us are certified teachers, but we all love to help and were willing to share what we do know. They were very excited by our offer and last week we became the four newest "profesores" at the elementary school! We take a grade every day and teach both English and Computer classes. The school had 3 computers donated a while back but no one knew how to set them up or really how to use them. We put them together, got them running and have started teaching the basics of how to use them. In English class we are teaching them simple greetings and fun ways to remember numbers or colors. It has been helpful to interact with the teachers and learn a bit more about the school system here. It is also fun to see our own kids from El Bichito in a different setting and we think they like that they are already friends with the newest teachers in their school. Although we only have a week left, we are excited for what we can teach them in that time and for the great connection we have now established at the school! We are excited that the next group of interns will be able to continue with these classes and help these kids even more!

Friends and Crushes at the Aldea (Carrie)

January 30, Carrie:

For the past two weeks I’ve noticed how the children at the Aldea are good about playing with different groups of friends. The kids still have people they are more likely to play with, but in general, they are good at including each other and varying who they play with. When we play sports it’s especially fun to watch how all the kids, of all ages, can play together and still have fun! This past week I was told that Alfredo, one of the boys in house 2, has a little crush on one of the little girls in house 1 named Antonina. On Friday, the Aldea had a birthday party for the children who had birthdays in January which was really fun. At this birthday party there was dancing, which shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone because Peruvians love to dance! During the dancing part of the fiesta, Alfredo asked Antonina to dance and they danced holding hands, with Antonina giggling the whole time and Alfredo standing there being a perfect gentleman.

This week we played in the pools that were donated to the Aldea with the kids on Tuesday and Thursday morning. I also had the opportunity to help teach an English class with Caesar who works for the Aldea and Julia one of the new interns for southern cross. Other than that we played soccer at least once a day, played a game called Kiwi and went to a fiesta for the kids with birthdays in January that was held on Friday.

Child Highlights:

1. Victor David in house 2 and I played monopoly two separate times after dinner. I was eating at their house this week.

2. We watched Lucho and Renzo in our house for 2 hours on Thursday while their Tia was gone. We played ball and tried to get Renzo to walk.

3. I talked with Victor David about what he likes to do, he's a really smart kid who loves reading and learning new things. He helped me with some Spanish and I taught him some things in English like "my name is...," "goodbye," "good morning," "thank you," and "how are you."

Enrique in Porcon (Mike and Natalie)

Enrique came to La Granja Porcón for a few days to learn how to weave fabric out of wool. One day while we were down at El Bichito, he told us he was interested in learning in the artesanía (craft) shop, and so we arranged it for him to come up. He arrived on Tuesday, July 27^th, and worked and played in Porcón until the morning of Saturday, the 31^st of July. He weaved on the loom in the mornings and early afternoons, and then had the rest of the day to relax. Elena, the woman in charge of the artesanía, said that he was a fast learner. He picked it up very quickly, and had almost finished making an entire handbag by the time he left on Saturday. He had the chance to go to the zoo, go to the trout farm, go on hikes, and participate in our English Club classes at the local school. He became friends with the kids in our classes and had a great time with them. One of his favorite things to do (as with all 12-year-old boys) was stand by the river and try to skip rocks across it. He had a great time, and didn’t want to leave on Saturday when the time came. He said that he may want to work as an artisan some day, but he’s still not sure yet. This was a good experience for Enrique.

After School Program (Mike and Natalie)

We have been here for three-and-a-half weeks, and things are going smoothly. In the school here in Porcon, we have been able to help the English professor in her classes. We have also established an after-school English club and about 20 kids show up for that each time. We've already picked a very capable student from the club to make sure it continues after we leave. He accepted and he will work with the professor to keep that club going after we are gone. We were hoping to get some teenagers from El Bichito to come to Porcon and work for a little while, but they all wanted to learn mechanical-oriented trades. We talked to Don Alejandro, Pedro, and Jacinto about what jobs they could do in Porcon and they were excited to have them work in the sawmill, as that would have been the best match for their interests. Unfortunately, though, the kids decided in the end that they were not interested in that. But we are going to give Pedro's and Jacinto's phone numbers to Feliciana so that in the future if there is a child who is interested in working in Porcon, she can set that up. We will also let Pedro and Jacinto know that she will likely call them in the future.

The Jenson's are leaving in one week, and the Huber's two weeks after that. We have all been making arrangements for local people to volunteer at El Bichito so that the after-school program continues after we all leave. We all decided it would be best for us to move down to Cajamarca and work in El Bichito after the Hubers leave. That way we will be able to keep it going until we leave and make sure that the people here are very familiar with the after-school program. Yesterday we had about 6 students from the University come and donate fruit and other food and they said that they will continue to be involved. Also, Natalie and I have met a man named Juan who works in Porcon and lives in Cajamarca. When he found out what it is we do, he said he would love to volunteer often at El Bichito. He used to work in another orphanage here, and he said he wants to get back into doing that and helping the kids. We are going to show him where El Bichito is so that he can stop by on weekdays to help out. So things are going well, and one of our main focuses right now is arranging things so that the programs we have started keep going after we are gone.

Thanks,

-Mike and Natalie

cute little Emerson! (Mitch at the Aldea)

Another fantastic week here at the Aldea! Things are running along smoother now, as we are all finding our own little niche here and contributing in ways that only we as unique individuals can. English classes are now occurring regularly, but we are still waiting for the computers to be moved into the individual módulos. We really want to start teaching the kids some basic computer skills.

I ate in módulo 8 this week. Mostly girls live there, but there are a couple of little boys, among whom one is Emerson. He still can’t talk yet, but that doesn’t stop him from expressing a little of his personality. He loves being apart of what the older kids are doing. Often after dinner or lunch I would play a dice game with some of the girls and he always wanted to be at the table with us and help gather the dice. He is an incredibly calm boy, but when you can manage to get him laughing, it takes a while for him to stop. On Thursday my módulo went to a special swimming pool in the afternoon outside the Aldea. We had to walk some distance after being dropped off, so I was in charge of carrying him to the pool. He made himself comfortable on top of my shoulders and really enjoyed the ride down to the pool. He is a super good kid.