The Summer English course for 4 and 5 year old children - Day 1 - The 4th of July 2016

The Summer English course for 4 and 5 year old children started today and even if the first part of the morning was quite tiring for the children,  who had to rely on the memory once most of them cannot read yet, they all seem to have enjoyed it. They were taught quite a few words so we then had to have a break before we initiated some other activities related to the animals they had learned how to say in English.

Each was given a velvet canvas with some of the animals, whose names they had learned and which they had to paint using coloured felt tip brushes as in accordance with a scheme of pre-determined colours. The youngest boy in the group (just 3 years and a half ) was given a 3D aeroplane which he assembled together with Ana, once he is crazy about any form of transportation.

They then had half an hour to do some animal puzzles (only one of them managed to finish it during that amount of time) before I had them revise what had been taught in the morning before going home.

As I was supervising the artistic works I once more realised that most children nowadays are not used to doing any, but once they are introduced to some form of Art they actually enjoy it.

Lisa and Salvador had to spend part of the afternoon with me and therefore managed to finish the artistic piece they had started in the morning having  ventured into other artistic pieces which had them decorate some wooden pinapples (a word they had learned in the morning) with coloured glitter and some small wooden key holders with glitter paint, as well as a sticker "painting".

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(To be continued)

Photos I have been sent ...

I have been sent a few photos by a Polish friend and Aeronautical colleague and two French couples I have recently met during the Vietnam circuit. They relate to my participation in an International forum in the Azores and naturally my trip to Vietnam.

It's nice to recall some of those moments, as well as the people who shared them with me.

The latest book I have read ...

Unfolding in two parallel narratives - one contemporary and the other set in the 13th century when Rumi encountered the wandering Dervish known as Shams of Tabriz who was to become his mentor The Forty Rules of Love is a rather  interesting and to a certain extent thought provoking book which gave me a further insight into some of the Sufism principles and philosophy I had been slightly introduced to during and after my trip to Turkey some years ago.

Being the third book by Elif Shafak I have read I must confess I very much enjoy  the way she writes and in this particularly the fact that every part is named after the essential forces of the Universe - Fire, Wind? Earth and Water to which she added another element - the Void.

"Every human being is a work in progress that is slowly but inexorably moving toward perfection. We are each an unfinished work of art both waiting and striving to be completed."

"The past is an interpretation. The future is an illusion. The world does not move through time as if it were a straight line, proceeding from the past to the future. Instead time moves through and within us, in endless spirals. Eternity does not mean infinite time, but simply timelessness."


"Intelect and love are made of different materials. Intelect ties people in knots and risks nothing, but love dissolves all tangles and risks everything."


"Patience does not mean to passively endure, it means to be farsighted enough to trust the end result of aprocess. What does pacience mean? It means to look at the thorn and see the rose, to look at the night and see the dawn."


"Things that can seem malicious or unfortunate are often a blessing in desguise, whereas things that might seem pleasant can be harmful in the long run."


"You might not change your instruments but how well to play is entirely in your hands."

The fifteen hour English Summer course for 4 and 5 year old children ...

Each English Language course for the children is a challenging "adventure" I embark on with interest and enthusiasm. It has been quite hard to find the plastic animals and fruits I need to complement the story book and the children's songs they 'll be taught this year, as well as the required artistic material and the puzzles and games, each of which will play its role in the children's learning process.

I have finally been able to organise the teaching rooms for next week's activities and feel ready to welcome the eight  5 to 6 year old children plus my colleague's slightly older child, who will be attending the English Language course starting on Monday. 

Some people tend to consider that teaching young children doesn't need as much preparation as the one required to teach adults and that these Summer courses aren't but a rather simple way of occupying" the children ... How wrong can they be !...

I have spent a considerable amount of time devising what to do and how to approach certain  subjects (basic grammatical aspects and even  issues related to the vocabulary expansion) and the main theme of the course ... and I am confident we'll have a good time (which is also important in any learning process). 

The African project ...

Going back to Cape Verde is still a few months away but I have already started buying  clothes for the children, taking advantage of the current sales, once in January I won't be able to find light clothes easily.

 

Getting things organised is always time consuming, this being one of the reasons as to why I prefer to do it meticulously and well in advance.

New outfits for Mr. Meno's little boys.

A T-shirt, shorts and earrings for Lavínia (left). A silk dress, earrings and ring for Leinira (right).

A T-shirt and earrings for Carine (left). A T-shirt and earrings for Verónica (right).

Several T-shirts of various sizes for some of the local boys and two T-shirts for little girls.

I have been given a huge bag of second-hand clothes, which are as good as new, that I'll have to collect and sellect soon, in order to pack them with the things I have already packed, as next time Noëlle and I will try to hand out some of the clothes and toys to the Associationof children in distress and the orphanage in Praia.

 

 

May we keep on having the stamina to help others out and alleviate part of their concerns thus feeling better ourselves.







 

The latest film I have watched ...

Spoken mostly in Indigenous dialects, Portuguese Brazilian and Spanish Embrace of the Serpent by the Colombian director Ciro Guerra is beyond no doubt a rather singular film, which like the main characters, takes us on a journey, one that immerses us in the growing friendship between an Amazon shaman, Karamakate (the last survivor of an Amazon tribal group - the Cohiuano) and two Westerners (a German scientist and explorer, Theodor Von Martius and an American botanist, Richard Evans Schultes) throughout two different time periods, the problematic of knowing where one comes from and heads to, resignation and defiance to external invasions, religious and native beliefs ...  

In spite of having been shot in black and white (with the exception of one Amazon scenary sequence with specks of green in an impressionist-like type of approach) it's frightfully beautiful, almost poetical at times.  The whole text  is powerful ... and the actors' interpretation second to none.

 

"The jungle is fragile and if you strike her, she will strike back." - Karamakate

"All I know is that when I came back, I had come another man." - Theodor

Having been awarded several major prizes it is really worth being seen ...