Day 7 - First day of School.

Today was our first day of school! The 6.30am alarm was not cool, but we were happy to finally be starting what we have come to Ethiopia to do. Taking the register was a little daunting because the children laughed everytime we said their Ethiopian name wrong, such as Tibebu, Nahom, Yedidya, Bitaniya, Wengel and Sominiyas. It will definately take a bit of practice to get used to them! We first did a "getting to know eachother" activity, and then asking the children to free write sentences about their Genna. Some children barely wrote the date, however some wrote a few sentences. The children then had Art and Amharic classes, which was a nice way for us to settle in as we got to see our class with other teachers. It was a difficult day in school, because we had no idea of their ability or previous learning, and the language barrier is a huge difficulty. Also, as the class teacher has gone away, we literally felt stranded with 18 children who couldn't speak our language, which was really tough! It was definately one of our "downer" days, but after a few Skype sessions to home we both felt better, and now we have planned some lessons for tomorrow we are excited to go back to school! :) Han and Jonny xx