SEW '08

This week at school was Spiritual Emphasis Week, so our whole schedule was different. We had chapel for a couple hours every morning (split between elementary and middle/high school) and then a couple hours of counseling and class discussions. After lunch we had regular classes, either the morning or afternoon classes, depending on the day. A band from the States, Station 2, was in Korea for a couple weeks to go to different schools and churches and they lead our chapels. The lead singer went to Liberty, but the band is based out of Columbus, Ohio. They were pretty good, and the kids loved them because they spent a lot of time just hanging out with them and talking to them. A lot of our kids responded... a few made decisions and several said they "got right with God."

Chapel in the auditorium/cafeteria

I was mainly assigned to the senior class, leading devotions and discussion time. We had some good discussions, and they were asking some really hard questions, which was kind of hard for me since I'm only 3-4 years older than they are, but since I'm the teacher I'm supposed to have all the answers to everything in life. :^) Some of them do face a lot, especially if their family is Buddhist. We talked a lot about apologetics and grey areas like drinking, and also what to do if their families make them bow down to their ancestors. Like can you bow without worshiping if you're forced to, and is it bad to eat food that has been offered to the ancestors (fortunately, the Bible does talk about that one). This group seems like a really solid class... they counseled each other and the younger grades, and a couple of the guys decided to go to the other high school classes and share the gospel to them. I was really proud of them. I enjoyed getting to know them all a lot better since we could talk about other things besides just classwork, and they seemed to open up to the new teachers a lot more during this week.

Thursday afternoon we had our school picnic in the soccer field on the other side of the rice paddy near the school. We had games like tug-of-war for the elementary and ultimate frisbee for the high school, and the high school did face-painting and made balloon animals.

7th graders making balloons

Elementary kids

8th graders face painting

It was a gorgeous day, sunny and very warm. The parents brought in all kinds of delicious Korean, American, and Filipino food and we had a huge picnic. After lunch, Station 2 gave a concert outside and a guy from SYME spoke for a couple minutes. It was a lot of fun. I didn't have to do too much besides crowd control so I could hang out with the kids and the other teachers.

Me and Joyce (11th grade and in my Span I class)

More 8th grade girls

Some Jr. girls

Well, those are some pictures of my students for you... I took about 150 during the week and at the picnic, and the kids want some of them to make it into the yearbook :^) Chao.