A Great Day At WAMATA


"The greatest good you can do for another is not just share your riches, but reveal to him his own"
Benjamin Disraeli



Today at WAMATA was very productive. I met with the girls early on in the morning, and we began review from the day before. I introduced spelling words that we will write out every day. I hope with some structure, things will come along well. The best part of the day was when I took the girls' pictures with a Polaroid camera, and had them do All About Me posters. I can't tell you how thrilled they were to see themselves, and it was a great learning experience. As well, they wrote things describing themselves in English. We talked about likes and dislikes, our families, ages and places of origin. It is interesting that in my class of 10 today, 2 girls are named Happiness, 2 are named Eliza and 2 are named Angel.

I introduced the idea today to the leader of WAMATA about having the girls learn to sew cloth coffee bags with Tanzanian coffee and the WAMATA logo. We will target tourists who usually purchase coffee as gifts. They loved the idea and the girls began sewing the bags during their sewing lesson. The way the program works, is that if a volunteer is available to teach English, the girls receive lessons, if not, they continue sewing all day. This will be their only choice for vocation in the future. Tomorrow I will be teaching them sewing terminology. I wish I would have learned to sew now from Grandma Bondy!!

I also talked to the program leader about considering changing the structure of the learning environment. The girls come for one week and then another group comes the next week. One week on one week off. This makes it very difficult for them to retain information. Within minutes of introducing the idea of the groups coming every other day, it was accepted and will be implemented beginning Monday. They are very receptive and appreciative of new ideas.

My tough time today came when watching the girls at "tea time". They are each given a cup of tea and 2 slices of white bread. I was told later that this is most likely their only meal all day, and on the days that they are unable to come to WAMATA... they typically don't eat anything, another reason why the every other day program might be a better choice for the girls.

Thanks again for your comments, and I'll be in touch soon.