Catch up class

When the school holidays began at Ruth Mother Care, it was decided that we would run a "catch up class" for the children at Family Believers Church in Nabulagala where we do the Slums outreach.  A catch up class  is basically a school run during the holidays to try and help kids go over things they find difficult etc.  We were teaching Maths and English.
  The first few days of the school holidays we spent preparing lessons and materials as well as visiting the people in the area to spread the word and let them know what was going to be happening.

 We ran the classes from the 8th to the 17th of December, teaching on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
   On Monday the 8th of  December we arrived and waited for the children to turn up.  We weren't really sure how many would come along, so it was perhaps it was a little overwhelming when 100+ kids turned up! As we only had 2 blackboards we split the children into two groups, those who were baby aged up to those in P1 and then in the other class p2+.  I led most of the lessons for the p2+ class, with Kathryn helping in crowd control and marking etc,  whilst Ruth taught the 'baby' class with the help of Moses a local volunteer.   We mostly taught sounds and how to write basic sentences and parts that make up a sentence.  In the mathematics we taught about fractions, addition and subtraction, and about time. 

  As I had a class ranging from p2 to p7 it was quite difficult to set lessons that would be appropriate for all the kids.   Usually I would try and set easier examples that would progressively get harder so the older ones would find some sort of challenge, but also ensuring the younger children could do some of the work.  I think I have found this the most challenging project we've worked on.  One day we had about 150 kids turning up!  80 of which were in the older class, certainly quite a challenge to teach and control all of them.  Though we got through it and survived! Despite the stresses it was also quite a rewarding experience. especially when teaching one on one with some of the kids.  It was very rewarding when the children understood what you were teaching them, when they had previously been getting the wrong answers.  We could actually see that we were indeed making a difference.  

  It was a very intense couple of days, and it definitely left us in need of a holiday!  Though after the holidays we are hopefully going to start some sort of school at the church, thus allowing us to work with only the children that don't get the chance to go to school.  Obviously this is still in the planning stage, but I am quite excited about the potential of working with the kids who need it most.  
Overall it was a very good experience, and I really hope that we were a blessing to the children and helped them in their work.  

Hope you're all having a great week!

Kenneth :)