Continued from The Love House|Education Program – Part II . . .
Another success story involves an 8 year old boy. He was malnourished for the first few years of his life and was finally placed into our care once he was nursed back to health and a little older. Although he is 8 years old, he looks like he is 4 or 5. I was shocked when I found out how old he was. He is completely adorable, but very small. He runs around giggling and playing; he is everyone’s friend. Yet just recently he has showed tremendous progress on his hand coordination skills. Teacha Jo comes to me weekly and will show me his papers with the ABC’s written out, or with his name in big, bold letters. He wrote it all, but only a few months prior, Teacha Jo said she couldn’t get him to hold his pencil or put it to paper with a steady hand.
Every single precious child in our childcare home has left all of us amazed at one time or another.
Our oldest boy is 14 and full of life. He loves to learn English and is one of its best speakers. He wants to listen to pop all the time and hopes to become a soldier when he grows up. He leads the other boys in influence and has so much confidence! I see a leader in him. I pray often for who he will become. When he is gentle with his brothers and sisters, the whole atmosphere of our classroom changes as he helps or cheers up one of the little ones.
Our oldest girl and oldest student is 15 years old and she wants to be a doctor. She is also the one who is always asking me for more homework and if she even gets one things marked incorrect, it doesn’t meet her standards. She also loves to sing and any chick flick available she will watch and enjoy to the fullest!
Another young boy gets bored with the work I give him, that is how quickly he learns! He is 11 and he sits next to his best friend all day. They are both at the same level scholastically speaking and they love to laugh! They compare their work to one another’s and are both extremely intelligent. They have both been impatient with the work I’ve given them because it was too easy. (Though they love to color.) This young man has the voice of an angel when he sings and he holds himself to a very high standard as far as his grades are concerned, too.
(Four of these kids are all biological siblings, separated for a time in different homes for caretaking and recently reunited. It’s a beautiful story.)
We have one boy who will make conversation with me when I am giving him an oral quiz. His English is beautiful and he is always adopting new ways to say things. He will go the extra mile and rewrite all of his answers to be in a straighter line, to be more defined with his pencil, to be neater. If he is bored with the rote of letters he is learning to read, he will make the work more challenging for himself by adding symbols to signify why he wrote something on way or another. He is one I truly believe could be an amazing scientist or surgeon one day.
One lovely little girl is gentle and loves pretty things. She is in the same learning arena as another girl, so they sit and work together. She is careful when she writes her answers and loves for her penmanship to be perfect. Beautiful colors and care with crafts is more important to her than finishing anything quickly. I love that about her.
Looking back at how much I’ve written, I guess I sound like a long-winded grandparent showing off wallet pictures, but if you’re still reading this, I know you understand why. The “beautiful dream” in this area of our work is one in which these kids will be given a chance at an amazing life, despite the circumstances life dealt them. The intricacies of their learning styles and the beauty of their little growing brains can send my heart to the moon…God is so gracious to show us how to fill in the cracks of the road that can lead these children He placed in our care somewhere amazing. Pray for them and remember the other little ones when you do; they are so small yet so strong and brilliant, in Teacha Jo’s care. (They are growing like weeds in everything, and their English is surpassing the older kids’!)
Coming up in the next part of Jayne’s series on Beautiful Dream Society Lesotho: Hope House – Lesotho Human Trafficking Shelter.
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My name is Jayne Cawthon and I am an intern in Lesotho, Africa for the Beautiful Dream Society. I wake up most days in awe of how amazing this opportunity is. I write down every event and detail my mind could possibly remember at the end of the day because taking it all in, down to the last sight of the sun as it sets, to the early mornings being awakened by children laughing, singing, and running on their way to school, is usually overwhelming and wonderful.
I also am the one in our house of staff members who loves to write. So I am going to share with you all some of the incredible things that are happening here in this city and this country, and to these Americans and volunteers from other parts of the world as we join with BDS. We want to see Jesus in the lives we encounter here, and we want to know Him more as we do it.