Third visit is the charm!

On friday I went into Northview Elementary School for my third visit to see Enci, and let me tell you, my head was in a fog. I did not really know what to expect, but I was definitely hoping for the best and expecting the worst. As it turns out, third visit seems to be charm.

When I arrived at the school, I found Enci in the tail-end of his other tutoring session. He was eating trail mix and m&m's, his reward for finishing, even though he was sitting on top of the desk and appeared to have been throwing his m&m's and books around the classroom. When the tutor saw me in the door window, she seemed overjoyed to let me have an hour with Enci, and I was actually filled with true joy myself at seeing the little boy. I don't really know what came over me, I guess it can just be explained in simple terms of faith, it was the Lord. He filled me with wonder and a childlike sense of exploration as I entered that room. I had a few things I had brought with me. I brought play-dough, Knuffle Bunny, and two I-Spy books, all of which I used during that session but not really in ways I had planned.

We started out with the I-Spy books and it seemed like Enci lost interest pretty quickly. He started to fidget. So I made a competition out of it. We raced to see who could find the things first, and since Enci beat me on the first item, I let him hold the book and choose the page. He was truly overjoyed and it motivated him for about two minutes. Then, just through my personal excitement and motivation to find things in the book, Enci began to play with me. We were talking about the pages and items, counting items, adding and subtracting, forming sentences, language and letter recognition, as well as introducing a ton of new vocabulary. As good as all this I-Spy learning was, I have to admit that it did not last longer than 15 minutes. Then, Enci was gone.

I picked up on it immediately though and pulled out the play-dough. We made many wonderful things and continued with the learning disguised as playing. I even carved a letter into my play dough and then asked Enci what letter it was and what something I could make that started with that letter. For example, one time I drew a "t." Enci told me what the letter was and then made the sound for the letter. When I asked him what I could make he told me a turtle. While I was trying to make this turtle and utterly failing, Enci decided he could make a better one. So we talked the entire time about how to make the animal and what its parts were, where it lived, where Enci lived before moving, what a turtle's family is like, and what Enci's family is like until we had finished our creatures. Enci definitely won.

Even when we were not competing, simply by keeping Enci busy with play-dough his mind was focused and I got to know him on a much more intimate level, and I praise God for that. At the bottom of the page I included some pictures from Friday.

I am learning that teaching a child does not mean standing back and watching him learn, or giving him tasks or activities that I come up with. Teaching is taking a journey with the child. It is being willing and vulnerable enough to take those same steps that the child is taking and showing them that you are not perfect yourself. You both learn from each other. It is interacting together to learn about yourself and realizing that teaching cannot necessarily fit into a neat and organized lesson plan. It needs room to change and grow. That's when both cultures are most free to learn.