Work study

Two weeks into our trade school program, and what have we done? We now have four boys and three girls, each with their own personalities and challenges in life and learning. All are wonderful people to get to know and teach.

 Garry and I (and Maria, his translator/assistant) taught the first two weeks of school, Monday to Thursday from 9- 12:30, with a couple of tea/smoke breaks (we have 3 smokers, I think). Honestly, it was mostly Garry teaching about cows, with 45 minute English lessons each day by me. Next week the group home parents will teach Math, Ukrainian language, Christian Ethics and computer use, the plan is that from now on the classes will alternate weekly, until December.

Kolya and Sasha have bikes to ride to work and class

Feeding calves- Valara

 Monday and Wednesday afternoons, and all day Friday (for those students not doing medical checkups, getting passports or registering with the government, all of which we are trying to do on non-class days) are farm work experience, right now that is mostly simple supervised tasks to get used to working with cows. Each student is "helping" the ladies with three milkings a week, (the cows are milked three times a day) doing things like dipping teats, brushing cows, and feeding calves milk. For this work they are paid slightly more than they are paying for room and board, so they have some money for spending at the store, however, it looks like Garry will need to pay them more when the winter utility bills need to be paid. They have the option of doing extra paid work on the weekends if they want, some students visit friends and family by bus, as long as they are back for school !

Garry showing Nicholai and Karina how to currycomb cows

They also have to help with household chores, like cooking and cleaning at the group homes, so they will have the skills to take care of themselves and maybe a family in the future. However, it is not all work. We had our first excursion this week, as you saw in an earlier post, and Garry is taking some (maybe all) of them into Zaporosia for a youth outreach event on Saturday night.

There is a ping pong (table tennis) table going into the boys house, and they seem to be a happy group over there.  There may be a few more students yet, we have more visitors coming out on Saturday afternoon to see the school.

The giant box of boys clothing that came form Reni-
thanks to Sasha's foster family who send it to share

Some of the smaller clothing we dropped off for the pastor at the
 village church to give away to the needy.