Hello, we are Helen and Mona, and we work as volunteers for the Tapulanga Foundation. We arrived in Silay at the beginning of September and will stay here for one year. We want to tell you about our experiences and about what’s happening at the St. Francis of Assisi School.
On September 11, it was our first day at the school. It was interesting to watch the flag ceremony, as there isn’t anything similar in German schools. The principal introduced us to the students, and we felt very welcome.
Helen joins Grade 8 on most days. There, she helps the students and teachers whenever needed and reminds the students to do their missed LAS.
Mona helps Ms. Ma in the preschool to sing and dance with the children, then she helps hand out the worksheets and work on them.
Furthermore, Helen had the chance to join Grade 9 in their cooking classes. It was very interesting to cook together with the students and to taste delicious Filipino food.
The preschool had a swimming day and we tried to swim one lap with the children and then take turns. Most of the children were very happy and motivated, and it was a lot of fun.
In our first month in the Philippines, we already witnessed two typhoons and one earthquake. We are glad that Silay wasn’t severely affected. It was our first time experiencing such forces of nature. Now we know that it is normal in the Philippines for face-to-face classes to be suspended due to high risk and bad weather conditions, and we know where to find the announcements when there is no school.
The last thing we want to report to you is the fire drills we took part in. We also have them in German schools, but we noticed some differences. Here, it is a requirement that firefighters observe and confirm that the evacuation was successful. So, there was one practice drill, and a week later, it was watched by the professionals. There are two different alarms, so everybody knows to which assembly point they should go. In Germany, we also stand separately in our classes, and the teacher confirms with a list that every student was rescued. Here, students themselves count, and it’s great that the students have so much responsibility and look out for each other.
We’re looking forward to staying here for a whole year and are excited to gain even more new experiences.
-Helen and Mona
No comments:
Post a Comment