Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Winding Down Kinder


Alicia
David Alexander

Oliver
Lizandro



sorting and putting in groups
Masks
sorting









































It’s hard to believe there are only a few weeks left of Kinder. It’s really exciting to see the kids succeed and complete the curriculum.  This home school program makes the teachers work easy at the end of the year, so all we have left to do is take pictures of the kids and put them on the diplomas. I’m hoping within the next few days we can take the 4 kinder kids and get our pictures taken at a photo shop, because we don’t have a cap and gown. At the photo shop they have one to borrow for the picture. Sometime in November we will have a lunch with the families and give out the diplomas. I’m so proud of Lizandro, Alicia, David, and Oliver!

This past month I have had my cousin here helping out at Casa de Luz. She is a great help with the kids and has been teaching English every morning. The kids love her and even after 3 weeks still try to talk to her in Spanish (yet her responses only seem to be yes, no, and thank you). Not only is it nice to have her help at the daycare, it is nice to have someone stay with me and go do day to day stuff with.

Some discouraging news that I take for granted, but realize that I haven’t shared often is the neglect and poor health of some of the kids. The health department visited Casa de Luz in the summer, weighed the kids, and told us that almost all of the kids were underweight and all but 2 were anemic. We have been working, as clever as possible, to add healthy foods (fruits, vegetables, and meat) into the diet. (On a frustratingly humorous side note- if the healthy stuff is not blended or shredded in, the kids just toss it under the table. No one at home gives them vegetables, so its hard to enforce it away from home) The doctors returned last week and gave us good news for some kids, but most of them are still underweight and anemic. The discouraging news is that when given medicine to take home, the parents are not giving it to the kids. Lice treatment we are doing at the daycare, for this reason. However, the parasite medicine needs to be given by the parents. Another little boy has had a rotten molar for a while and cried for a week. Finally, after much urging, the mom took him to the clinic to get it pulled. It’s sad because the reality is the mom works from early in the morning to late in the evening, being a nanny to another family, and has to neglect her own children.

For those of you who have been praying for Alejandro, I wanted to thank you and give you an update. I talked with his grandmother in the street and she said that right now there are not “bad cells” but he has to go one day a week for treatment. I’m not exactly sure what all that means, because I know nothing about medicine, but it sounded like a good report to me. She said sometimes he doesn’t want to eat anything, and sometime he has a huge appetite. I saw him the other day, as he was walking his brother and cousin to Casa de Luz and he told me, “I’m going to the daycare today.” And his mom said, “No honey, not today.” Then she proceeded to tell me that every morning he wants to come. Continue to pray for Alejandro, so that his immune system will be strong enough to be around other kids his age, and that the “bad cells” stay away.


Zulema pulled Genesis 2 front teeth