Break Time Update

Hello friends and family!

I've been back full-time at Amazima for a little over two months and I just wanted to write a quick update on how things are going and how you can be praying.

I started back at Amazima with a group of P5 students I had never really worked with before. These students were a lot like my AEP students from my first year - struggling to read basic English, failing most subjects, and a lot older than other P5 students. I jumped in mid-term and worked really hard to build trust with these students while also helping them learn to read. It has definitely been a challenge, but just before the end of Term 2, I felt like several of them had begun to open up to me and we were making progress. I'm hopeful that we'll make even more progress in Term 3. Please pray that I would be the teacher they need and I would know how to help them!

In Term 3, I'll continue working with this group of students, but I'll also be working with the P5 teachers to help them set up routines, procedures, and expectations to give our students more structure. We have 68 very rowdy, independent, energetic, challenging, but still wonderful students. During my few weeks back at Amazima, I've often seen the teachers struggle and feel overwhelmed with our students' behavior. Both the P5 teachers and our head teacher agree that there needs to be a change in Term 3 and have asked me to help with classroom management. Hopefully I'll be able to help and model some strategies that have helped me when teaching these students (which have definitely changed since my first year here - I've learned a lot!). Please pray for the P5 teachers not to be discouraged and that I would be useful in helping them in the remaining 13 weeks of the school year.

My favorite part of every day has been lunch time. I open my classroom and put out a few games for students to play (memory, connect 4, cards, pick up sticks) and play worship music. It started out with just a few students coming in at lunch, but now most lunch times I have 20-30 students hanging out in my classroom. They've asked me to print the lyrics of different songs so that they can copy them down in their school notebooks and we spend our lunch hour talking about the lyrics of the songs and where they come from in the Bible. The girls I taught my first year in Uganda are in my room every lunch period asking challenging and deep questions. Answering them has turned into a mini-Bible study each day. I'm so thankful for these sweet lunch hours where God reminds me of how He is at work in the lives of these students. Please pray that students would continue to feel safe to ask hard questions and eager to find truth!

God is at work here in Uganda! I know that there are so many faithful friends praying for me and I am so thankful. I'm looking forward to visiting many of you in December!

💜 Jaci