Monday's a BIG DAY!!

Wow, can't believe this is actually happening. But, here is the story behind it all...

A few weeks ago some kids from the seminary here were playing outside. We were all out on the porch and we asked Grady and Hadley if they wanted to go with the kids and play. They were up at the top of the hill in the palm trees where we live making a fort. Grady and Hadley, of course, immediately started running up to them. Joel walked up with them.

Joel started talking to another adult that was also outside his house nearby. Hadley was playing around Joel along with another little girl. It wasn't long 'til Grady came back to the porch. I went back outside and asked him why he came back. He said, "I don't know how to talk to them. I don't know Portuguese." Heartache.

Joel and I started talking about what we could do as far as Portuguese. Things have been kind of on hold for us since the first part of December. I have an excellent book that I've been going through...it has taught me so much about the Portuguese language and rules and when you say what and so forth. But, without going to classes, I really just lack in speaking Portuguese...really getting in practice with the things I'm learning. It's been magnified during these last 2 months since our young married group hasn't been meeting and all the students from the seminary were gone during that time. So, of course some of that would pick back up shortly. For the kids too...they would be able to talk to and play with the kids again on the playground. But, in reality, we just don't make it up there as often as we should in order for it to count as good exposure to the kids (and good practice for me). Other than that, we go to church once a week and our househelper comes twice a week...but those are the only scheduled exposures to Portuguese that happen regularly.

So...we thought and prayed about how we could maximize our time. Portuguese would come in time, for sure...esp. for the kids who do pick up languages much faster than us slow adults. :-) But, we started thinking, how could we help me learn Portuguese and at the same time give the kids a good jump start in it too? We thought of having someone come to our house and just talk to us every day...just conversing in the language. But...another thought was...

There is a school within walking distance from our house. The seminary president's wife is the principal there. Some of the wives of the seminary staff work there. All of the kids of the seminary students and staff go there. We've heard excellent things about it. So, we went to check things out yesterday.

We loved what we saw. One of our big cautions in all of this is that we still have the desire to homeschool. We are, of course, looking at this as "Portuguese class" and even calling it that. But, if we started this going-to-school-somewhere-other-than-home, would our kids always desire to do that? What I mean is, if they GO to school in this season, will they not understand staying at home for school in the next season?

I emailed one of my mentors and asked for her thoughts on the matter. She has homeschooled all 6 of her children exclusively (and loves it). But, she also had the history of being a child in a foreign country...a missionary kid to be exact. So, she wasn't just a homeschooling mother (like me), she also had the added advantage of seeing it exactly from Grady's and Hadley's perspective too.

Of course we also prayed about it immensely and waited to see what God opened up for us. Basically the consensus of me, Joel, the mentor, and God (we feel)...enroll them.

So, after talking to them at the school yesterday and loving what we saw there, here's what it's going to look like...

Kids here in Brasil go to school only half days. The younger kids at this school go in the afternoons. Perfect for us. So, 1pm-5:30pm, they will be at "Portuguese class." :-) Again, if we call it "school" then they will always think of school as somewhere they go, so we are just calling it Portuguese class; after all, we would never even consider this in a million years if we lived somewhere where English was spoken...we are, in fact, doing it solely for Portuguese purposes. We thought of the possibility of them going just 3 days a week or so, thought of them only going 2 hours...all kinds of possibilities. But the more we thought about it and after we talked to the school (which they said it was completely up to us...they left it open for us to decide and didn't even give any suggestions), we decided to really maximize the limited amount of time that we have here (we will be moving during the summer anyway). So, they will be going full-time.

I also asked the principal and the coordinator of the elementary section what they suggested for me...to maximize my being without the kids for 4 1/2 hours. They suggested I come there and help. STUPENDOUS!! That 1) makes me feel better about the kids being there...hated just 'sending them off' at 3 and 4 years old (they will be in their own classrooms, but I will be just a couple of doors down), and 2) of course gives me just what I need in terms of Portuguese. I will still be studying on my own...of course I won't have anything like assigned homework to take up my time here at the house, but I can just study exactly what I'm needing to know at the time. And, 4 1/2 hours of speaking Portuguese a day. Just perfect.

So...starting Monday me and the kids will be heading over to the school for "Portuguese class" every afternoon (OH MY GOSH!...what a change in our routines). As for Eissa...of course I hate leaving her too. But we have a babysitter (Carol) that will come Monday, Wednesday, and Friday (our househelper's daughter...she has been our babysitter alot and the kids love her), and then the other 2 days Eliane (our househelper) will be here. Eissa usually sleeps 2 - 2 1/2 hours in the afternoons anyway...and since Carol and Eliane only speak Portuguese, she will be having a little Portuguese lesson herself. :-) Everybody wins.

It will be extremely busy and different for us. So, just send a few prayers up for us in this new and different time. I will be going, as I said, every day...until the baby comes (due date is 6 weeks away). After that, of course we will have to re-evaluate some things and see how things go. But, we are very excited about how God arranged this for us and we feel complete peace about it all. We'll keep you posted.

Now, a few pictures...

First of all, here is a book that we got in late October. The kid is a whiz at mazes and has been for some time, so I thought this would be a great "school" for him whenever he asked to do school. So, he asked to do school one day (or do "something special"...those are frequent requests) and I got this out. I circled the page numbers of 6 pages. I told him to do the mazes on those 6 pages and call me when he was done. I went in the other room. After awhile I thought "surely he is done." I went to check...apparently I had not made my instructions very clear. :-) He had just continued circling the page numbers and doing the mazes on each page. Ha ha ha. The kid was on page 49 when I got to him. So funny. I think he needs a little more challenging maze book. :-)
So, we laughed and I put it up (so he wouldn't finish it in one day). When I got it out again to do I always stayed with him and limited his pages, and we did a little at a time. I was able to spread it out over 3 months despite the jump start. :-) Here he is with his certificate of completion. Finished his first "homeschool" book.
And here's the school where we will be going for "Portuguese class" (let's all practice saying that, not "school"). :-) Me and Joel have been practicing. Anyway, this is one of the recess areas. On Fridays the kids are allowed to bring their own toy(s) from home, so there were some dolls and big trucks and stuff there yesterday. Fridays are also free days, but the other days they have scheduled games and stuff during the recess. Our next door neighbor is one of the P.E. teachers there.
Look at their little soccer goals.
Hadley will be in the 3 yr. old class (she'll be 3 on the 20th of this month). She might be with this teacher...
in this classroom.
Or, in this classroom with this teacher. Actually every class has 2 teachers...and about 16 or so students.
Grady will be in the 4 yr. old class. This is one of the classrooms he could be in.
They were studying the color yellow and the circle shape yesterday.
This is the schedule of their day.
He could also be in this classroom. They were also studying yellow, but had had popcorn the day before, so they focused on corn yesterday to tie it all in.
The schedule of their day.
Another view of the classroom. Aren't the classrooms so cute?