I'm back!

Wow, I didn't mean to not blog for almost 2 years. So, same blog, but new adventures.

In a nutshell...

I completed Peace Corps and went to Mozambique for a week!

Then I came home, saw lots of family, and enjoyed the holidays in the states.

Babs and I went to Williamsburg right before New Years.

Then I became interim youth director at my church, and got to hang out with lots of fun teens for most of 2015.

After I finished that job, I took a roadtrip down to Tennessee and Atlanta, to see friends and family.

I also went with friends to Frank Beamer's last football game at UVA.

We got a LOT of snow in January of this year. 

I also started being more of a bird nerd and photographing birds.

Karen and I and a few hundred thousand of our closest friends went to see the cherry blossoms on the national mall.

I went to the National Zoo a few times this spring, and PANDAS!

My church went on a mission trip to Charleston, SC and I got to help lay some floors.

I visited Bryce Canyon National Park and Zion (pictured) National Park with friends.

I also went white water rafting down the grand canyon again. 

And now I have a job! I'm a project coordinator for a public health project in Malawi with a cool public health/international development company in Maryland.

So, more adventures coming, and I'll back-blog on some of these and other things from the past 2 years as well. 

Goat stress and lion stress

If you've been reading my blog the last few months, it may seem that all I do is plan and run GLOW camps :)
And while that has been a big part of my service, especially in the past few months, I am doing other things. Aside from the random things that come along like the chalkboard project, the thing I do the most on a regular basis is teach guidance and counseling classes.

Guidance and counseling here is an interesting hybrid of health class, some civics, study skills, and career counseling. The topics range from things like stress and anger management, communication and decision making, self awareness and goal setting, to reproductive health, HIV, contraception and teenage pregnancy. There are also topics like voting, crime, career choices, and what it means to be a citizen. These last topics overlap a lot with the social studies and moral education curriculum, so I don't cover them in my classes. I'm not sure the American should be teaching on what it means to be a citizen of Botswana, ya know? :)

Currently I'm teaching 9 of the 18 classes. 5 are Form 2 classes, like 9th graders, and 4 are Form 3 classes, like 10th graders. My favorites are the Form 2s. Form 1s are still very shy and won't talk AT ALL. Form 3s think they own the place and senioritis is setting in. Form 2 is a nice middle ground where they will sometimes talk, but aren't giving me too much attitude.

So far I've taught lessons on self awareness, stress management, communication, goal setting, gender, and peer pressure. Soon I'll be getting into sex and reproductive and condoms and stuff, and that will be a new level of hilarity I'm sure. I really focus on the basics though, of knowing yourself, making decisions that are good for you, managing your own stress, etc. 

So much of the message these kids get are negative: DON'T get pregnant, DON'T have sex, DON'T drink or do drugs, DON'T get HIV. But I feel like most of the time, the kids aren't a) given the tools to not fall into these problems, and/or b) Not given good alternatives to these things. So I'm trying to approach it holistically. Instead of scaring you to death about the dangers of teen pregnancy, let's look at your goals and what you want to accomplish. Now how would getting pregnant get in the way of the cool things you want to do? What are some ways you can avoid that?

Sometimes the kids literally won't talk at all in class. Often they say they can't understand me and want me to speak Setswana, although classes are supposed to be in English. Lesson planning is usually me figuring out what information I want to get across to them, and then figuring out a way to do that which is both interactive AND something they will understand. Sometimes it's writing on big paper and getting teachers to help me translate key words. Sometimes it's having them write their answers instead of speak, or raise their hands to vote what they think is right. Often it's me saying something in broken English and broken Setswana, and trying to judge how many of them understood what I just said.

One of my favorite lessons has been on stress management. I explain that sometimes things that cause us stress are actually good things. I give the example of goats.

Me: What causes you stress? *list their answers on the board* Is all stress bad?
Class: Yes.
Me: Ok. Now, are goats bad?
Class: No.
Me: If a goat walks into class and starts eating your book, what do you do?
Class: *giggles*
Me: *Walks to a student, takes her book* Ke podi. Ke ja buka ya gago. O dira eng?  (I am a goat. I am eating your book. What are you doing?)
Girl: Chase it away.
Me: Exactly! Goats aren't bad, but goats eating your books, ke mathata.  (It's a problem.) Now, what would you do if a lion came in the room?
Class: Ieesh. 
Me: Ditau. O dira eng?  (Lions. What do you do?) Shoo them away? *I pretend to shoo away a lion)
Class: *laughs* No! Run away!
Me: Right! So, stress is your body's way of saying: Stop.  There's a problem. And it's up to you to figure out whether you should fix or cope with something, or get away from the problem. Is it a goat stress, something that is a good thing, but causing a problem? *label some of the things on the list with podi  (goat)* School, exams, being a teenager, friends, boyfriend. Or is it tau stress, something that is never good, that you need to get help or distance from? *label some thing on the list with 'tau'  (lion): abuse, death, lack of food, HIV. *

From there I give them examples to talk about in small groups, and we end with talking about healthy ways to cope with stress. Hopefully they learn good coping mechanisms, and that even good things can cause stress. And that no matter if it's a goat or a lion, it's always okay to ask for help.

I'm probably not going to be a career teacher, but for the most part, I'm having a lot of fun with this :)

May GLOW Camp, Part 2

Each day we had a few morning sessions on lifeskills topics: 

Monday: leadership/volunteerism

Tuesday: stress, reproductive health/contraceptives, and gender

Wednesday: self esteem, HIV, and gender based violence

Thursday: goal setting and decision making

Discussing consequences of decisions.

Afternoons rotations included crafts, journaling, and soccer games with an HIV focus.

How many of these balls can you juggle?

We all juggle school, sleep, friends, sports, hobbies. 

When you add sex, you could also add STIs, HIV, and pregnancy.

All of the sudden, you are juggling a lot more things!

Collages during craft time!

Evening activities included a movie, a carnival and a talent show.

PCVs practicing for our talent show act: singing, the cup game, and juggling. At the same time.

We had singing,

dancing,

audience participation,

and a tradition, PCVs singing Lean on Me.

On Friday, we had a certificate award ceremony.

Me handing out certificates to my girls!

My Lempu girls <3 p="">

Camp GLOW!

Was awesome. In a nutshell.

There were some closing up activities. We did attempt to clean ALL the things.

The girls were super excited to ride home in this nice bus. Cue singalongs and tired PCVs.

And loading up for the final leg of the journey home.

I can't promise sustainability of GLOW camps with respect to getting teachers to plan their own, completely independent of Peace Corps. But the teachers are interested in using these lessons in their classes, and these girls had an amazing week they will always remember. Win in my book! 

May GLOW camp, Part 1

After all of the planning, we finally got to do the camp!

Can you believe that ALL of these girls and their things fit in that truck?!

We talked about leadership, and did an activity leading each other blindfolded through an obstacle course.

Leading and following

GLOW camp in a nutshell: Different kinds of stress, demonstrated with goat and lion categories.

And do NOT put oil on a condom!

We tye-dyed 

And made a LOT of friendship bracelets.

Works of art.

We had visitors: PC country director and director of PC internationally!

We signed each others' name posters.

We had fun with face paint.

We had mad hula hooping skills.

Lots of games during a carnival.

Musical chairs.

Ok, I had fun with face paint too!

Some PCV outtakes... 

Not vomiting popcorn, but eating out of your friends hands when yours are dirty.

Be careful trying to take apart the hula hoops...

It takes a lot of effort, 

And someone might get hurt in the process...

Victory!

Sometimes GLOW camp requires drawing a lot of vaginas.

Vagina drawing skills, PCV win!