I thank goodness that I worked at the Hempstead Boys and Girls Club before coming to teach English in Georgia. I see so many parallels everyday to the low income school district I worked in in the States to my Georgian school district now. My experience there helped me learn the patience I need to work through this experience. There were days when the internet didn't work or people wouldn't show up to meetings. Similarly, in Georgia teachers don't show up some days, and there is an extremely low amount of resources, which leads me to my animal activity.
I wanted to have the kids color in pictures of different animals and practice writing the different names, but of course finding a coloring book of animals would be impossible here. Instead I remembered a great trick from a co-worker at HBGC where she drew outlines of pictures and then made photocopies for the kids to color in.
I couldn't exactly make photo copies, but I could draw out the pictures each by hand and have the kids color them in. That's exactly what I did and they LOVED it! It was worth every colored mark on my hands! It amazes me how such a simple activity like coloring in animals could make the kids so excited to learn English. I feel like because we don't have a lot of resources there is less creative activities and more translation and exercises from the books. But even with such limited resources I was able to make learning the names of animals fun! 
What would a day with animals be without 'Old McDonald'? So I did a rousing performance of the classic farm song, and the kids just couldn't get enough. Were still working on it, but I know in a few months they will be able to make all the sounds of the farm animals!
Cute picture alert:
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| Nino carved mine and her name into our mchati (corn bread)....so fun!! |
how cute are you Tara! Love the old mcdonald song singing haha
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