another week over...

Hello there - thanks for all the messages and for the positive comments about the blog - glad you enjoy my ramblings!!

This week has been even more hectic than usual. From Monday - Thursday we had parent/teacher interviews - yes, with the parents of Pre-school children. We had a great time with very positive feedback from parents. Primary school age starts at 6 in Malawi and yet when parents can see that their children can recite something in English or write a few letters, they assume that they can send their children even at 4 years to primary school. Unfortunately this past year, about 5 children were taken to primary school when they were not ready and have since been relocated in various nursery schools!

When I was escorting one of the parents out of school this is what I found. Just outside the front door, two of the boys from the Pre-school class were very busy with scrubbing brushes and lots of soap washing two of the chairs from their class. This is an exercise we do in the practical life and the kids love it - the parents were amazed. We will have the cleanest chairs in Mzuzu by the end of this year!

On Wednesday we were training in Mzuzu when I got a phone call from the husband of one of the teachers to come quickly as his wife was sick. I rushed to the house to find the teacher was in labour and had to rush her to the hospital where she delivered a baby boy a few hours later. I might have a picture for the next blog. Both Mum and baby are fine.

Our head teacher who I mentioned was not well, is still not well - very high blood pressure and now requires a hip operation, so today she is travelling to Blantyre to see a specialist to find out what they need to do. Please remember her in your prayers.

Yesterday, Saturday we were out all day training caregivers and committees - we had a great day, and once again saw the real need that there is for training. The caregivers literally have not a clue what they are supposed to do with young children. Here you can see some group work...



This is some of the group busy taking notes as the facilitator is speaking.


These are some of the materials we make for the centres - dolls and the alphabet which actually is a game and has a song for the children to learn their names and the letters of the alphabet.

This coming week I am attending a workshop for the Strategic plan in Education Department - it should be very productive. I hope you all have a good week, and look forward to your comments.

Blessings and love from Diane

PS the picture at the top is our children in Mzuzu lining up to wash their hands - don't they look smart! We have had a challenge this week as the water was off for a couple of days - can you imagine a school with no water!!!

what a busy week...

Greetings from a hot and sunny Mzuzu (with the odd shower of rain). I have had a really busy week and am glad of today to have a rest!

Last time I was talking about training in Viyele - I went again this week to talk to the committee of the nursery school, together with one of the trainers. I was impressed to see that they have started a school garden so that they can supplement the plain maize porridge which the children receive every day. Here you can see the head teacher standing in front of the garden where they have planted soya beans, This is a real encouragement as maize porridge on its own gives little nutrients to a child.

Here you see Enala talking with some of the nursery school committee.

We also went to Zolozolo nursery school to do some in-service training and the photo at the top of my blog is some of the kids from that school.

Rumphi was on the agenda this week too. When we arrived to begin the workshop at 7.30am there was no one there but gradually they came and we had a really successful day with caregivers and committee members. We were really well looked after. Here you see some of the participants doing an exercise.

I really enjoy teaching the caregivers - the knowledge we give them is very basic as really early childhood development has had no foundation in people's lives, and when we talk of playing with children it is a new concept for many people! Here you see me leading one of the sessions.

The minister in the congregation has a new baby called Favour who is a delight and I spent a lot of time getting to know her!!

And while all this is going on, our school in Mzuzu keeps moving forward. Mrs Msowoya, our head teacher is sick and will be off for some time - please keep her in your prayers. She has very high blood pressure and also a very painful hip. We miss her a lot.

In the 3-6 years class this week there was a lot of fun. The theme was continents and the kids were learning all about the continents. One of the teachers drew a map of the world on the floor and the kids were blindfolded (thanks to South African airways blindfolds), and playing a game of jumping from one continent to another. They had such fun and yet learnt so much in the process.

Another day, the kids were marching around the room, singing and playing various musical instruments - makes me want to be a child again!

The weekend has also been busy. I had visitors from the Church of Scotland for supper on Saturday night which was lovely, and today after church (which only lasted two and a quarter hours) I had a friend over for coffee.

Now looking forward to putting my feet up and reading a book. The coming week is also a busy one with parent/ teacher meetings all week. We have prepared a parents booklet which we are going to share with them to encourage parenting skills at home. In church today, we had a nurse encouraging parents to give their kids plenty of fruit and vegetables as many chidlren have a vitamin A deficiency. Together we hope to improve parenting skills and see a change in health and education of our children.

Wishing you a great week.

Blessings

Diane

ramblings...

Hello again from a hot and sticky Mzuzu.

We have had a lot of rain this week in the city so mud is everywhere - its a nightmare in the school as we have no separate room for eating lunch so when kids eat the room has to be cleaned as they play outside. This week they had to sit on the verandah and have a shower while the room was cleaned before they could go inside again. With it being the rainy season the grass grows almost as soon as it is cut and unfortunately the snakes like the new grass and we found a long thin black one in the school grounds this week. Fortunately as it was raining none of the children were in the playground! (the joys of Africa!!)

My good friends came for supper last Monday night as Rev Chimwemwe (on the right) was returning to South Africa on Tuesday where he is studying - we had a lovely time catching up! Chimwemwe is our singing Pastor and has released some CD's of his music which are really good. He is with his wife and daughter in the photograph.

Training of caregivers in nursery schools is ongoing, and this month we are doing some training within Mzuzu city. Nicolas and Enala were out on Thursday and I went to see how they were getting on and arrived at snack time. Here you can see the kids eating their morning porridge and Nico and Enala seem to be enjoying it too!




Last time I mentioned that a container had arrived with some materials for Early Childhood. I was very excited as I was sorting them out for various schools. We received some great equipment - thanks for all the notes I found in the boxes and even a box of chocolates!! Yummy!! Thank you so much for the support for this ministry. The training boxes are brilliant - we are well equipped for the next couple of months thanks to peoples generosity - much appreciated.

In the boxes I had packed when I was in Ireland last year there was a lot of Montessori equipment and for those of you who are Montessorians, you can see it being used in the next couple of photos.

This is a short bead stair, one of the pieces of equipment we use for maths and which the children love working with.

Unfortunately one of our teachers lost her 'mother' this week - her aunt in UK terms. It happened very suddenly although she had been ill - please pray for Gift and her family as they come to terms with this loss.

Teacher Enala is back at work after being in hospital - she has yet to find out what was wrong with her!! Its great to have her back.

Its mosquito time with the heat and the rain - they love it, and they love me too, so I am constantly battling against these tiny creatures....always wondered, why did God create a mosquito??

Will leave you with that thought. Thanks for all the comments. Have a great week.

Diane

more wildlife....

Hello from a very humid Mzuzu

This week has been extremely hot and humid with some torrential rains showers, which in turn brings out the wildlife! Here you can see one of the many snails which live in my garden - they are in abundance - shame that we don't eat them - there would never be a scarcity of food! They are rather large compared to snails found in UK.

I felt very bad the other day when I lifted a basket in my house only to find that I had scared this poor lizard and so he shed his tail. Here you can see the poor lizard without his tail, and on the next picture you can see the tail without the lizard!!


On Wednesday, a PCI container arrived in Mzuzu so there was great excitement as it was opened between showers! I received many boxes for preschool and I want to say a big thank you to all the churches and groups who sent them - already we have given boxes of materials to 11 schools within Mzuzu, and they are delighted to have some materials. We are planning training in the next two months within Mzuzu so the training boxes are really useful. Thanks to one and all for these gifts of love to the children and caregivers in Malawi.

One slight problem when a container arrives is that we do not have anywhere to store the boxes until we can deliver them so this picture shows you the state of my hall today!!! My spare bedroom is also packed full, so no visitors this week please!!!

My camera was not on hand this week but we are blessed in school with a German Volunteer who has come to YWAM (Youth with a Mission) in Mzuzu. She is a young girl doing a gap year before going to University. She has been a great help as we had 2 teachers off sick and 1 admitted in the hospital! Life is never straight forward here.

One of our colleagues in Education department was admitted in hospital during the week and sadly died on Friday. One of our teachers from school was admitted to hospital on Wednesday afternoon - it was Thursday evening before a doctor saw her. I was with her today (Saturday) and the doctor had come again this morning and put a drip up and took blood from her. The drip had finished at lunchtime and had not been checked since (it was about 4pm when I visited). Please pray for our teacher that proper medical care will be given and that she will recover soon.

In between all of the above, I entertained visitors from Ballymoney, and have been planning our training programme for the next two months..........

So its been a busy week with one thing and another, but its been enjoyable.

Wishing you a great week ahead

Diane

Planning and spiders...

Welcome to another blog........its been quite busy at school as we have 3 teachers off,two are sick and one has a sick child. Also one of our cleaners is also off to work in her garden. So out of 9 workers we only have 5 and its been hectic for the teachers who are present.

Fidelis is a young man who used to work with World Relief in Chitipa and is currently studying at African Bible College. He is on holidays at present and has been volunteering with us each morning helping in the toddlers class. I am so thankful that he has been with us due to lack of staff! Here you can see some of the toddlers singing a song and doing the actions!!

I am so proud when I look at this picture of our 3-6 years classroom. It is hard to believe that its the same place as 3 years ago when I arrived. Children are all busy doing something to aid their development.
Nicolas is a young man who is doing his work experience with us. He is currently studying for a Diploma in Montessori Early childhood Education through Montessori London. It is tough as he is doing it by distance learning. However, so far, he is doing well and I am looking forward to having a qualified Malawian on our team.

This is Lumbani deep in concentration as he syringes water from different containers - good for building muscles in the hands and fingers!!

On Thursday I was attending a workshop for the Education Department Strategic plan. It was really good - all departments presented their work (including me with Early Childhood Development). Here you can see our facilitator Martin who is from the Netherlands and works in the Synod as Capacity Building Officer. He is with my colleague Happy who works in accounts. All the paper stuck on the board behind are part of our plan!!

And this is Vincent, one of the project officers with myself as we do some group work!

Drama again in my house on Friday night - saw something moving across the wall and it was a visiting tarantula - it was enormous - the door frame below the spider is 5cms wide and the length of the spiders body is 5cms! Sorry to say it is now late!! I didn't fancy sharing my house with it!

Yesterday I had a friend here for lunch and she brought a German volunteer with her who wants to spend a few days volunteering at school. So.......God is good - he provides when we really need help!

Wishing you all a good week.

Blessings

Diane

looking back...

Hello there

Not a lot has happened this week - just the usual although we have had some fierce weather the past two days. Yesterday we had torrential rain and wind, thunder and lightning - I thought the house was going to blow away. Among the rain were ice drops (not hailstones as they were too big) - lumps of ice - the picture does not really do it justice. The noise was amazing considering we have tin roofs on the houses!! Today we had the rain and lightning again without the ice thankfully!! I would not be surprised if some people have lost their houses in Mzuzu - my garden fence blew down!!

In good old Northern Ireland style I am sure you do not need to hear me rambling on about the weather. I have to do a presentation on Thursday about Early Childhood Development and have been looking for inspiration in some of my old photos. Thought I would give you a laugh as you see how the ageing process works. Unfortunatley I do not have digital photos before 2005 or maybe its fortunately!! This is me in Zomba on the beautiful mountain and looking at this photo made me realise that I miss the place a lot. Don't I look young!!!

The good old nursery school in Zomba still has the pictures which I painted back in 1995!!

At the last graduation ceremony for the students which I was at in Zomba!

With the ZTC community at the Womens' Ministry in 2006 just before I left Zomba to go to Mzuzu.

At my watchman's church in Zomba...

Leaving Zomba Theological College Pre-school - here you can see me opening a gift from the nursery school committee.

I think a lot of you have seen this before - when I spent the year in South Africa in 2004, I worked in an afternoon club for Aids orphans called Jim Jam. This is me with Thabo the cutest child in the place!! (and probably the naughtiest too)

My first big job when I arrived in Mzuzu was to help in a training programme for some nursery school teachers at a centre within Mzuzu. The lady in front of me is one of our teachers in Mzuzu CCAP International Pre-school.

The first big workshop with the trainers for Early Childhood Development in 2008 - in case you are wondering about some of the attire, we were beside the lake!!

and later in the year as I was planning a training workshop in Chitipa - had to sample some of the cooking!! Now you know why I never lose any weight!! The picture looks hazy - its actually the smoke from the fires they were cooking on.

and finally, the reason why I am here..

Blessings, have a good week

Diane

somethings going on below us...

Hi everyone

Just a quick note to tell you that last night about 1.15am there was another earthquake in Salima this time further south but on the lake shore. Nothing like the Haiti one, this one was 4.8 magnitude but still frightened a lot of people. There are a couple of experts here from USA at present so maybe they can help the people to understand why all these earthquakes are happening at the bottom of the rift valley!

Have a good day

Diane