Hello! We have been in Panama for a little over a week now and I am loving it. This month is going to look a little differently. We have two ministry assignments this month, one for the first half of the month and one for the second half of the month.
This blog will be about the first half of the month because our second half of the month will be its own blog later on.
This month has been spent teaching English. Our team is split into three groups; between our team, we are teaching Kindergarten through the 9th grade.
Britney and I are together and we teach the 5th through 9th grades. We help them read in English, have basic dialogues, and we have been helping them recite tongue twisters in English such as “Peter Piper.”
We have been to the church that the school runs through on Sundays and Friday, and I love it.
To be honest, I had no idea to even expect for Panama, but I have loved every second of getting to be a part of these 70-80 something students’ lives. I love junior high and high school students. I have such a deep desire to minister to people in those age groups.
I served as a youth leader in my church for 5 years prior to the Race, and I was a student leader before that. I miss my students from Crossroads all of the time; they were some of the hardest people to say “see you later” to before the Race. A lot of our English students remind me of them.
This week has been one of my favorites so far. We help the English teachers teach the kids, and the teachers and kids help us with our Spanish. I love getting to work with the staff of the school and church.
In the afternoons when school is out, we help clean and do small construction projects, which is great too. We get to help Salvador, a man who works countless hours at the church and makes our breakfast and lunch. And when we are around the church later in the day, we get to spend more time with the students.
Here’s your outlook on our first week in Panama! More updates soon!
