First Day

8:00 Eager children, pictures with the teacher, shouting in the hallway, backpacks, parents, timid hellos . . . the first day of school started off like so many others. I welcomed 16 cheerful faces into fourth grade and started them to work, going over my expectations and procedures. While many of the standards are the same, so many things were different about this first day.

Six of my students are boarding here and their dorm parents' daughter is in my class as well, meaning almost half of my students live in the same house. The others live either on upper station - RVA, or lower station, which hosts two hospitals and a Bible college. My beginning-of-the-year questionnaire started with: Where are you from? Where do your parents live? And . . . I had several kids ask me how to answer that question. I told them I was right there with them . . . "Where are you from?" still sends me for a loop.


10:00 Chai time. Kids grabbed a snack on the way out to an (almost) unsupervised recess time. They know where to find their teachers - the staff room with tea or coffee in hand. The 25 minutes flew by, and after debriefing about the morning, we prayed for our students, especially the new ones, and for sickness and safety.

11:55 Lunch! I took the boarders down to the new cafeteria and dropped them off . . . the rest disappeared to their homes or to settle on steps around Titchie. I headed home myself for an hour of catching up on email.

1:00 The kids lined up outside the room, chattering excitedly about our Titchie hike. After bathroom needs completed and water bottles are filled, the entire elementary headed on an almost two-hour hike around lower station. We learned which tree the Maasai use for deodorant - prompting all the sixth grade boys to finish the hike with leaves stuffed under their armpits. I relinquished the teacher 'field trip panic' and trusted that my kids would make it through ok . . . and they all did. And I got to play outside for a good two hours of my afternoon!



3:30 The last of my kids straggled back from the hike, grabbed their gear, and headed home. This teacher paused to reflect on a good first day, a new class, and the responsibility of educating these 16 little ones.