Happy Thanksgiving!

Rounded up one fellow Canadian and a handful of Americans for a wonderful Thanksgiving Celebration.
A fun evening complete with a little Tim Hortons coffee and Hot Chocolate, some $100 napkins, Turkey, chicken, brusinková omáčka (cranberry sauce) garlic potatoes, rotkohl (red cabbage) and even apple crisp and Moose Pie for dessert! It was an evening of bountiful fun and blessings

I have plenty to be thankful for and I am blessed beyond reason! Praise the Lord for his numerous gifts.

I am Canadian

One of the inevitable first ice breaking questions you encounter in most conversations here is "where are you from?" My accent betrays me, and many I have met assume I am "American." Do I correct them? True I am from North America and therefore I am technically an "American" but I would never call myself an American. I am finding out more and more how Canadian I am and yet how even my European roots have affected my cultural identity. Cultural identity is interesting and I find myself having to adjust not only to Czech culture but American culture as well. 


I think what I struggle with most is the egocentric thought that my way must be the right way.
 "What? You don't do it that way?" 
"You don't say it that way?" 
"You don't know what that word means?"
"Well that is just weird!"
 How wrong I am... it is NOT weird... it is just different! 

Why do I cling so much to the identity of the country from where I was raised? Why is where you are from so important? The question "Where are you from? "is a spring board in conversation and gives the listener context as to who you might be and what you can learn about the person.
 I am from Canada; I will occasionally say Eh at the end of a sentence when I am seeking a response or agreement to a statement. I may say words differently and use unfamiliar terms. Yes that is a toque, and a chesterfield and sometimes I am a Keener. I enjoy wearing the maple leaf on my jacket and on my back pack. But who I am does not rest solely on where I was born. I am a follower of Christ. I choose to act differently. Talk differently. Live differently! I am a stranger in this world no matter where I live because ultimately this is not my home. The life I live I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave his life for me! 

Perhaps the question should not be "Where are you from?" but rather  "Where are you going?" Eh?

Be Patient

Being Content to Wait

This fall during my Social Unit we have been learning about different character traits and attributes and what it means to be a citizen in a community. So far we have been learning about friendship, honesty, kindness and being a good listener. This week's lesson has been about patience and I have been teaching the kids that patience is: "Being content to wait."
 As part of our project we have been making little illustrated squares which we will put together to make a community quilt. Each square demonstrates something about the character trait of the week.

One of my students (who is learning English as his third language) finished his square and brought it to me, and I asked him to explain his picture.
Our little dialogue went something like this:

Me: "Tell me about your picture"
Student: Pointing to the person in the picture he proudly states "This is you!"
Me: "Wow very nice"
Student: "You are pretty"
Me: "Why, thank you, and who is this?" I say pointing to the stick man in the picture.
Student: "A man!" He says with great enthusiasm.

It was all I could do at this point to not burst out laughing to ask who was the man.

*Now the story doesn't stop here, however when I retold this encounter to some of my co-workers, at this point of the story their initial response was like mine as they broke out into a fit of hysterical laughter. When they regained composure they acknowledged my student's keen sense of perception. What a insightful boy, indeed Miss Robinson must be waiting for a man.* 

It turned out that the man was my dad and I was waiting for him to come visit. My parents had come to visit last year and my students were asking if they would come again and I said probably not, but we will have to wait and see. Funny what our students remember and their perspective on things.

From August - September Racing Onward

Racing Onward

Recap of events to date.
Arrived in Prague on August 2 @ 6pm
Gained possession of our new flat on August 3
Slowly started to move my belongings from Chodska flat to our Vinohradska flat
August 5 - joined two fellow TeachBeyond team-mates and hopped on a SwissAir plane to Basal Switzerland...  to attend the TeachBeyond Summer Institute
August 11 Return back to Prague
August 12 - 26 - Finish moving my flat, my classroom (moving across the hall) and moving in new families and teachers. (This is the first time in our school's history that all of our staff are here before school begins!
August  27-31 - CISP Staff Orientation
September 5 FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL

Being in Several Places at Once

From August 5-11 I had the wonderful pleasure of joining 40 or so other TeachBeyond members at the summer institute in Kandern Germany. Sort of like a conference to recap the year and gear up for a new one. It was a time of renewal, preparation, education and fun. We participated in different topical sessions including: spiritual formation, Biblical integration and Cultural Intelligence. It was a great time to connect with different teachers as well as many others who are involved in the ministry of education overseas, including dorm parents, IT technicians, school planters and fellow educators.

It was a time to reflect on my past year and look towards the year to come. I am blessed to be apart of an amazing team of people who are committed to providing Transformational education for children and adults around the world.

Our time in Germany was short though we did manage to take a few outings including a trip to where Switzerland, Germany and France meet. I got to be in three countries at once!

  

 

   


Home Sweet Home

This year I am sharing a flat with two of my friends that work with me at CISP. It is a lovely 3 bedroom apartment that overlooks a small park and is just down the street from the metro, my church and a quick 10 minute walk to the school.
Pictures are of my room and the view from my room.

First Days of School

September has come and gone so quickly that I can scarcely believe it! Things that are new this year.
I have a new classroom! I am now teaching grades one and two which gave cause for moving to a bigger space across the hall.
Teaching a split class is usually not on a teacher's list of favourite things but I am excited to have some of my students from last year and to invest some more in their lives. This year I have 8 students representing 5 different nationalities. I also have a few families in my class who are serving in different ministries in Prague and the Czech Republic.

 

Please continue to pray for our school as we pursue a new building. We are in the process of negotiating a lease contract for a building that will be able to accommodate our entire student body. Currently our high school classes are being held in two apartments down the street and we share all the facilities in our current building with a Czech school and preschool. If we get the building we will be set to move this coming June. Lots needs to happen including a little cosmetic work of painting and fixing flooring; along with raising the funds for classroom equipment: desks, chairs, whiteboards etcetera. We are excited for this new step in our school growth.

So far on the front of recognition with the Czech Ministry of Education we are playing the waiting game. Our last application was denied by the Ministry of Education, shortly followed by a change in the local magistrates decision who chose to finally give approval for our school. So now we are waiting to see if we can make  an appeal of the ministry's decision of our last application.

8 Wonderful Reasons
I Get Up Every Monday Morning

      

I am excited for our year ahead and can't believe we only have 9 months left together!

Christmas in July       

Christmas is my favourite time of year. I love the Christmas carols, and smell of cedar boughs and roasted turkey. It is a time for family to gather together and celebrate Jesus’ birth. Living far away makes it difficult for my brothers and I to be home for Christmas. However, this summer we were all able to get holidays at the same time and all be home in the middle of July. Although 5 months early, we decided to celebrate Christmas! Mom loves to decorate and went all out and decorated the house, including a small fake tree and stockings. It was a wonderful time of turkey, small fun gifts and even a fire (in the backyard pit, rather than the fireplace).

Now Christmas time in Canada isn’t complete without a little snow and we got that too! Just had to go up into the mountains at Kingfisher to find it! We are a quadding family so we loaded up the ATVs and took a rocky climb to the top of the lookout at Kingfisher. Although I ached for days afterwards it was a great adventure with the whole family.

  

God’s Miracles

Being in Canada for a month was a whirlwind trip. It was an excellent time to visit with friends, connect with supporters, share about my ministry and see my family. One of the many highlights for me was getting to visit with some of the girls I taught at KCS last year. I had the amazing opportunity to teach these girls for two years and it was so great to catch up with them.

One of the biggest blessings was to see one of God’s miracles. Hannah, one of my students, has a heart condition and was extremely sick. Just before I left she was confined to a wheelchair, unable to walk even the shortest of distances and was at high risk of cardiac arrest. I was brought to tears when she walked across the room and came to give me a hug. She hadn’t had a cardiac episode in almost a year and was able to attend school for the majority of the school year. What an answer to prayer! She continues to be a walking miracle!

What’s it like to be back 'home'?

  



It was great to be back in Canada, to see my family, friends, familiar places and to be surrounded by Canadians! I did experience a little reverse culture shock. Biggest thing I noticed was how BIG Canada is! Distances to get places, shopping centres, streets, and even food portions in restaurants seemed much bigger. I think the idea of home has become a little blurry for me. Is home where you reside? Where you were born? Where you were raised? Where you have spent the majority of your life? I have come to realize how temporary our time is here on earth and slowly understanding that right now what we call “home” is temporary. Prague is slowly becoming a place dear to my heart and so is Canada and yet I long for the day when life is complete and I find myself at my eternal home with Jesus.

Making Changes

Amazing how many things can change in such a short amount of time. Changes for me this year include moving to a new flat. It is a few steps closers to our school and the metro station, with a view of the park.(pictures to follow after boxes are unpacked)

I also will be changing classrooms since I am teaching grade one and two this year. It will be wonderful to spend more time with my old class, who are all English language learners; as well as working with a new batch of grade ones who all have English as their first language.

The biggest change for our school thus far is changes in the decision for CISP’s recognition with the Czech Ministry of Education. At the beginning of July we had a meeting with the magistrate in Prague who had given the recommendation to the Ministry of Education that our school was not needed. As a result our application for recognition had been denied.

 Our director described this lady’s heart to be quite hardened towards our school and changing her mind seemed rather hopeless. However, with many prayers and a petition in hand our administration continued to fight. Addressing the magistrate with a petition signed by people in the community affirming the need for our school resulted in a compulsory review of our case. By a miracle of the Lord the magistrate overturned her decision and gave approval for recommending our school for recognition! This is a huge victory for our school and a blessing from the Lord. However the war is not quite yet won. We now need the Ministry of Education to reverse their decision and approve our previously denied application for recognition. What this recognition means is that local Czech residents can attend our school as a legal Czech recognized  school. Currently many of our students have to split their time between our school and Czech school. This recognition will bring us steps closer to opening our doors to more families living in the Czech Republic. 

Please continue to pray with us that we may receive this recognition with the Ministry of Education.

Favourite Things

Near the end of the school year I interviewed the elementary Gr. 1-5 and a few high schoolers, asking them, what was their favourite thing about CISP; what did they like about being in their class this year. Putting all of the answers into one video would have made it very long so here is a small sample of their responses put into a video I made for my presentation at church this past Sunday.

Spring Concert

Our Elementary had a Spring Concert at the end of May and the Grade Ones did memory verses and songs to go with each memory verse. It is amazing to see how far their language has come in a year! I was so proud of them and will have to admit I think they stole the show :)