Introducing Breezes...

2day was my third and final week of Jouth classes, for now at least. I must say, at the beginning of the class, at about 2:30, i was a bit worried we would be doing the class with 3 junior youth participants, meaning there would be more adults than anything else. Both my parents came, since we need 2 CRB checked people and ruth's parents were there. So by 2:30 (class is supposed 2 start at 2) we had 4 adults, 3 youth and 3 jouth, 2 of which were Ruth's brothers and 1 was a new boy, Muhamad...bit of a disaster really. But all was not lost, 2 arrived a few mins later...extremely late but they got there, Sahba and Nassir.

2 be very honest...the three of us, while preparing the class at 1, had no energy. All of us were completely dead, but we forced ourselves 2 get sth 2gether. I tried 2 stay out of it as much as possible, seeing as Reema and Ruth would be continuing without me from next week. We decided on a format and hoped for the best...

So we began our class, more than half an hour late, with a game...fruit salad. They absolutely loved it...so much fun. Everyone sits in a circle, with one in the middle who says...'everyone with...(then they gotta choose sth like white socks)'...then everyone with white socks has 2 get up and find a seat while the person who was standing in the middle also tries to find a seat, obviously leaving 1 person left in the middle.

We had some very funny happenings. Muhamad...looking around at peoples feet and saying...'everyone with shoes on'...he knew obviously that there was only my mum, who grudingly got up and Muhamad took her seat. She then got her own back by saying...'everyone called Muhamad'...this game worked really well and brought a lot of laughter...but we've found that the popularity of the game completely depends on the group...they didnt want 2 stop playing this one...but eventually we had to stop them...

We moved on to a recap of last week's virtue...service. We had been discussing a service project of some sort. They had decided on washing cars as a local service. Now, even in my mind i thought...impractical to begin with...but hey, its beginning to seem pretty realistic. We made some plans, and everyone had a job to do at home.

We then gave out the books which had been ordered during the week. We just mentioned the price to them, but if they don't pay, its not a big deal...maybe the LSA can help with it. So we began the first lesson...it worked AMAZINGLY well...they took to it so quickly. In all honestly, i thought it was too basic, but they really really liked it. I read the story to them first...then they read it to each other in pairs...the quiet murmuring of the story was so cute 2 hear!!!!

They then did the activities individually, and went thru them together afterwards...they really enjoyed ticking the ones they got right...adorable!!! The next exercise involved making sentences out of words given to them. We wrote each one on a piece of paper and they picked it without looking. They then made a sentence each with the word they picked and read it out. The others guessing which word it was. The guessing part they actually decided to do themselves, but it worked really well, they all enjoyed it and it made the simple exercise more fun. To add to it we got them to make one sentence with as many of the words as possible. We had one participant who was our essay writer...he spent so long on writing his sentence making it a work of art...we all loved him for it. They finished the last two exercises off individually, sharing it at the end if they wished.

We had a quick fruit break which was well received and continued with the program. A drama activity. They had to prepare a skit on the theme of joy or joyfulness...since the story had a minor theme of joy. This led on to our virtue discussion we decided to have weekly. They seemed excited about the prospect of drama, and although 1 group did mess about for a lot of the preparation time, it was a good first time.

We then briefly discussed the virtue of joyfulness and they wrote it down in their little notebooks. They were then given a mission...like secret santa they were all given a name of someone else in the group...with a mission to do sth or give them sth that will make them joyful. We gave them two weeks to do this...with the strict rule that they could not share who they have with anyone but me reema and ruth. If they were absolutely stuck for ideas we could help them. We finished off with the usual art activity of colouring the virtue we discussed...they loved the glitter pens we gave them, although it could have created a mess...we were lucky.

Refreshments served at the end, and they all went to play outside. I did have to say bye 2 them all...and i will really miss them. It was a pleasure 2 help run the class even for the short time i did. I will definately come back and see how its all doing when i come back in Jan.

One thing we decided to do, for now at least, was to call up on Saturday and just check everyones remembered and they are coming and theres no problem with transport or anything. Until it gets into their and their parents heads that this time is regular, ppl r gonna have 2 be reminded.

Here's the group from today...cept Nura (Sahba's little sister) who joined us at the end...

So there you have it...our 3rd week...

WeEk TwO

Ahhhhhhhhh! welll today was an interesting session, we had six jr youth; Dalitso, Khama, Sahba, Naz, Mwanga and John. Mwanga and John did not attend the full lesson last week but atleast they were part of our second ' semi intro' lesson this week. Derryn & Brooke could not make it because they were away in scarborough but we should have them back n rolling next week; Chimuka could not attend either because of a personal reason :-) which hopefully should be sorted before next class. We ordered some copies of 'Breezes of confirmation' and are hoping to start the book as soon as we can, at the moment we still feel like we need to get a bit more settled with the jr youth and make sure we have recieved all the consent forms from their parents. Overall it was a fantastic session, we started off with some games which the lovely MAY ( who i personally think is loving taking part in the games and activities a little too much hehehehehe) joyously and energetically facilitated; we played 'Zombie' which is a game where one person walks across to another person and with the most scary look on their face, arms stretched forward ,n some strange voice,call out the name of the person they are walking towards. The other person then has to wallk across to someone else and do the above actions before the zombie catches them (ok i know, round about now you are thinking, 'what game is this?' but the idea of the game was to get familiar with names. We also realised that the game 'Concentration' is a group favourite, probably because we only get it right a few times hehehe.
After the games, we returned to my house and had an activity where we paired the jouth up and asked them to get to know the other person and instead of presenting orally, they would have to do a creative drawing or painting or anything that they felt portrayed the other person or their personality and hobbies. The results were more than just creative!!
it was also very interesting to see how inlfuential FOOTBALL is and just how many people it describes hehehe, i must say... this particular activity did get people sharing things and views that may have not been necessary for the lesson however We ( the faciliatators) chipped in and tried to remind them about our class 'rules' and also the virtue of Respect ( i really wont go into depth about what was said about people that support certain football teams hehehe). After the presentation of the creative, arty stuff, we had a mini break during which we had a few more games outside

and later some drinks to cool down. It was then back to business, and May introduced the virtue of the week which is 'SERVICE', the virtue led to a good discussion with a few ideas from the jouth about what they want to do as a form of service for the local community

at about 4pm ( we atarted at 2pm) we were left with just enough time to colour in our virtue of the weeeeeek and refreshments!!! Here goes a pic of our FAB work! hehehe ( again, May enjoyed this activity a little too much! :-)

I must say, besides our little moments where We ( Reema, May n I) had to remind the jyouth about being more considerate & respectful and a few absent people, we did manage to have an enjoyable and succesful session!!! :-) THATS ALL FROM THE JOUTH ZONE THIS WEEK!!!

No longer animator virgins

We have broken the barrier!!!!! We officially have a Junior Youth Group!!! How EXCITING!!!! It's every Sunday from 2-4:30...but we had a shortened session 2day, cuz our odd little community decided sometime ago to have their feast at 4 2day...but anyway, it was a nice intro session.

Before getting down to business, we had 2 plan what we were going 2 do...me and reema (shes gonna help ruth after i go) and my dad (cuz hes CRB checked) arrived late cuz of a pond disaster we had...details on my blog. Anyway, we got there, shared the supplies we bought and planned what we were gonna do. We bought loadsa stuff - pencils, pens, colouring pencils, felt tips, gel pens, glue sticks, folders, little note books, paper, card, glitter pens and loadsa other bits and bobs. We decided who was gonna do what...and what we wanted to achieve that session. And of course we shared our worries and excitement...

So we started with about 5 j-youth, Ruth's 2 younger brothers, Karma and Dalitso, their friends from school Derryn, Brooke and Nassir. Sahba, who used to live in Milton Keynes, arrived a little late. We began outside, with concentration (names instead of numbers). Was really funny, cuz 2 begin with they couldnt do it...and neither could my dad, which was the funniest part really. But we got better at it...and it was a really good game 2 get 2 know names. We then played another name game, where we stand in a circle and one person throws a ball 2 someone. They catch it and duck...the 2 ppl either side of the person who ducked have 2 race to say each others names...u could have it that the slower one sits in the middle, but it was cool just 2 play. The last ice breaker we did was the pairing one...having some questions 2 ask and remember bout ur partner. Overall it was a pretty successful intro cuz i personally felt the group was quite close.

Reema, my dad, Ruth and Nassir

Nassir again, Dalitso and Derryn

Sahba, Karma and Brooke

We went back inside, and two late comers arrived, Mwanga and Chimuka and their little brother George who was adorable!!! It would have been really cool to do some ice breakers with them too, but we just didnt have time just then, plus there was a possibility that more late comers would arrive. We sorted out the necessary stuff...the consent forms they had 2 give to their parents, the registration form we have 2 fill out and their folders we got 4 them.

As planned, we then discussed the virtue of respect, getting them to give us ideas about what it is and why and when we should practice it. They were great at coming up with things, and came to the conclusion that we should respect everyone and that the world would be a better place if everyone respected everyone. Here we are, discusssing respect...

The purpose of talking about respect was mainly to lead into discussion of the rules of the class...which they came up with themselves. We felt talking bout respect first was good cuz they had that idea in their head when thinking bout what the rules of the class should be, which ultimately centres around respect. They came up with a perfect list and we followed this we a fun exercise where we had printed the word respect on a piece of paper and they could decorate it any way they wanted. The idea was they would have a virtue a week where we discuss it for a while, preferably related to the particular lesson in the book (which we chose not to begin that day) or one we felt was necessary to discuss at that time. They'll decorate the virtue every week and we'll give them a ribbon of some sort where they can pin each weeks up...so they'll have sth in their room that'll remind them and their parents can see what they're getting up 2.

We didnt have time for much else, but we gave them the virtue of service to think about for next week and told them a bit about the book, Breezes of Confirmation. We then had refreshment, in the living room which we decided was a very bad idea, but luckily we had no accidents. Right at the end, another boy arrived, John...had transport problems, hopefully fixed now tho...so we had 5 at the beginning and 9 at the end...we have another 3 confirmed next week and another maybe...so we may end up with 13 next week...will be interesting.

All in all...it was a bit rushed and disorientating when they all arrived at different times, but it was a great first session and hopefully they all enjoyed it are looking forward to coming back next week...they all seemed keen...which is the important thing. Hopefully i wont have to leave Ruth alone next week...cept we've had this family thing planned for ages, and i cant really pull out of it...but we'll see.

Everyone, please start up a jouth group...its the best thing u could do with ur time. Plus its really fun :) Ruthy and I will keep this updated and when i go, im hoping my sis will aswell. Here are some pics 2 finish off...

Excitement/nervousness b4 the J-youth arrived

Brooke :)

Dalitso - intense concentration

Arty Farty bit...

AHHHHH!!!!

Jouth really do rule :)