Letter bingo

Posted by Brian

Another week has passed in the Dominican Republic. The students are really responding well to the class we are having. Most of the children just hang out in front of the little house we use as a school. They sometimes get a little rowdy and loud so we have included in our discipline plan behavior in the vicinity of the house. These children have nothing else to do, they really have no toys or structured activities and their parents have to do some work to earn money often the children are left all day to wander around the village. Needless to say these children sometimes get into trouble. We are trying to provide some structure and accountability for the children.

We played letter bingo with the older children this week, ages 9-13. Playing this game revealed to me how much work needs to be done. Most did not know the letters so I would get to the end of the alphabet cards, having called every letter and we still wouldn't have a winner. Also we were playing hangman with vocabulary from a book we read with the same age group and it was hard for the students to choose a letter. It is hard to imagine a 12 or 13 year old not being able to identify the letter, but in the area we work in and in many area in this country I believe his is the norm and not the exception.

Please pray for these children. They fight so much among each other. One minute they are playing and the next it escalates into a fight and then into rock throwing.