Celebrating and giving thanks at Spurgeons.

 This past week has seen the start of the new academic year in Kenya, and so most students have been returning to school. Two year groups are yet to return to school – they are the ones who took national leavers exams and are therefore progressing on to the next level of education. But for everyone else, this week was back to school.

I’d been into school a few times the previous week, when no students were present, so that I could deliver training to teachers without distraction. It was great to do the training, and it was good to have the undivided attention of the teachers, but it was kind of strange to be there without the background noise of children doing their lessons, charging around the playground, and calling out hello.

So, to go in to Spurgeons Academy yesterday and find it full of children again was a real delight. The reason for going along yesterday in particular was to attend, and take part in, a morning of celebration and thanksgiving. It’s a new event for the school, especially at the start of a new year. Previously anything like this would have been at the end of an academic year and primarily just for the year groups who were leaving.

But this new approach was to focus not just on giving thanks for the ending of the previous year, but also to give thanks for the start of the new year. It was about saying thank you to God for the provision to see the children through the long break – for food, for health, for being able to return to school this term. It was about saying thank you to God for the teachers who were committed to stepping forwards into the new year, and provide support to the children in their care. And it was about saying thank you to God that we can trust Him to provide all that is needed as we step into the unknown.

It was also a time to celebrate the achievements of the students, and of their teachers, and this came in the form of small financial gifts / incentives to those teachers who had achieved the highest grades through their students final marks. Support staff were also celebrated – from the social worker, to the cook, to the groundsman. And the talents of the children were celebrated through song and dance, from the youngest to the oldest.

It was a beautiful time indeed.

I had the wonderful opportunity to share some thoughts and information with the parents about understanding how the brain works, how different parts impact each other, and what influence that has on behaviour, learning, problem solving etc. I also shared some thoughts on how we aren’t all designed to respond to a situation in the same way, or learn in the same way etc, and that as a result, our children might not be doing things differently just to annoy us, but because it is their natural way of doing things. The ultimate message was to love our children for who they are, not wish for what they aren’t, and to support them in positive and open-minded ways, as they are gifts from God, made perfect and not a mistake.

It was a real honour to be the ‘guest speaker’ and as I looked out at the Spurgeons family, I was reminded yet again just how much I love them. I’m not there all the time, I can’t input into the life of each child, but I do have a role that I can play, and that is a real privilege. I feel so welcomed by staff and by children, and yesterday it was lovely to interact with the parents as well. When I am there I can listen, I can input to the teachers, I can encourage the children, I can look for openings to bring additional support. And as I leave and travel onwards, I can pray, I can advocate for, I can seek opportunities to raise additional resources. I gain so much more than I ever give when I go to Spurgeons, and I am forever grateful to God that I have this relationship with them.

The year ahead is not going to be smooth, there are some huge mountains to climb in terms of school development in line with new government requirements. It would be very easy to feel daunted and overwhelmed by it all. But instead it was a huge joy to embark on this year with the school in a state of thanksgiving to God for all that He has done in the past, does now in the present, and through faith will continue to do in the future. 

 

Day 2 in Rwanda

The conversations with various members of the GNPDR team today, were as inspiring as was the conversation yesterday with Ketia and Justine. Here are my reflections from one of them.

A key focus was around the Outreach programme for children living on the streets that two of the team run. Angelique and Jeremiah have been running this programme for about 6 months now, and already are starting to see some fab results, and have helped a couple of children return home.

 

They visit the same two sites each week, so as to be a regular presence, and build trust with the children who use those sites as their base. Some of the children are 'full-time' street kids, whilst others are 'part-time' ie they go home at night, but spend the days on the streets, scrounging for food, begging for money, unable to afford to go to school. Their ages range from 7 - 17 years, and they are mainly boys.

We chatted about the challenges that they come up against. For example, when they go down to one of the sites and discover that the police have done a random rounding up of all the children they can find and thrown them all into a detention centre, where the children just have to wait for someone to come and 'claim' them. This might be a parent, or it might be a community leader who has been contacted to say that some of his juvenile residents are in the centre. Others have no-one come for them, and eventually just get released, but that could be after 5 months of confinement.

 

One of the other challenges related to the aim of helping children return home, and return to school. Such an admirable aim, but so complicated to achieve. A lot of time was spent discussing possible strategies and steps to be taken for repatriating a child, and how to increase the chance of success through better planning, preparation, and management of expectations, of the child, and of the receiving family. 

 

A key aspect to the outreach work is the conversations that Jeremiah and Angelique have with the children. Mostly these are one-on-one, but often it is hard to have a really decent conversation as they are always on the street, with people walking past, traffic blaring, and lots of other distractions. What they would love to have is a drop-in centre, and so thought was given to this. We chatted through their vision for this development of the work, and the next steps is to cost it all out. It will only be a simple one or two room building, but it can provide a safe, quiet space for the children to come to, and that in itself is a luxury none of them have access to at the moment.

The work that Jeremiah and Angelique are doing is making such a difference to the children that they are reaching. Admittedly they aren't reaching all of the children who are on the streets, but their thinking is that it is better to be a regular, trustworthy presence in a few places, rather than an occasional presence in a lot of places. And I'm inclined to agree!

Day 1 in Rwanda

 I've just popped across from Kenya to Rwanda for a couple of days, to spend a bit of time with Pius and his GNPDR team here in Kigali, and also to be out of Kenyanito's way whilst all the schools in Kenya start their new academic year today and tomorrow.

One of the main focuses of today was to meet with Ketia and Justine, who are both involved in the prison ministry work that GNPDR carry out. Justine is a prison chaplain and carries out visits to some of the Rwandan prisons on as regular a basis as all the other demands on a chaplain's life allow, especially when that chaplain is also widowed mum to three young children. Ketia doesn't class herself as a chaplain in that she hasn't done the ordained bit, but in every other way she could be - she certainly has the heart and the faith for it. Instead, she considers herself to be a trainer, and loves to get to the prisons whenever there is an opportunity or invitation, to deliver talks and workshops to the inmates. 

As a result of the 360Life training that I've delivered in the past, and which they have both attended, and as a result of the massive increase in mental health challenges amongst the population generally, and particularly in prisons, much of the training recently has been to do with trauma, mental health, and the links between the two, as well as potential impacts on life choices, behavioural patterns, social skills, decision making etc.

Today, our meetings revolved around the desire by Ketia to formalise some sort of contextualised 'mental health curriculum'. This has grown out of feedback and additional questions from the prison inmates regarding the training mentioned above. Ketia shared how hungry the inmates are to gain more understanding and insight into the brain, how it works, what happens when it goes wrong, what can make it go wrong, and how all of that together can help them work out and understand themselves better. She spoke of the times when one of them has a 'lightbulb moment', and something clicks into place. No more shame, no more guilt - when they realise the role that negative external influences can have, even if many years ago. Then there is also a realisation that they don't need to carry shame and guilt, or think that it is all because they are just a bad person, or worthless, or a waste of space, or whatever else they've been led to believe all these years. The release from all those negative thoughts can open up space for a new perspective on life, including thoughts on how to live life post-release. Self-belief starts to grow, and dreams start to take place of a more positive nature.Wondeful!

It was so good to have the meeting today and to spend time discussing with Ketia and Justine what this new programme could look like. It was lovely to see how 360Life is feeding into the development of something that can serve these prisoners here in Rwanda in a culturally-contextualised way. And I am looking forward to continue to support and feed into the curriculum as it develops further, until of course it is the right time to step out of the way.

Neurodiversity workshop at Spurgeons Academy

Today I had a lovely day with the teachers of Spurgeons Academy, running a workshop for them on neurodiversity. 

Its always good to be with them, and to be able to help build their knowledge and skills base so that they can better teach and support the children of Spurgeons Academy, 80% of whom are single or total orphans. Today was no different. 

I shared info about dyslexia, dyscalculia, dyspraxia, autism and ADD, none of which the teachers knew anything about beforehand. It was info I’d pulled together from online courses, relevant reliable websites, conversations with parents of neurodiverse children, and other professionals. It was definitely basic level info only, but even that was an eye opener for them in many ways. 

I was very mindful that the teachers don’t have access to assessment opportunities for children who they might have concerns about, and that they don’t have access to resources for additional input / classroom assistants etc who can help out. There also aren’t the accommodations over here to give children extra options in exams - additional time, a scribe etc that can be an option in the Uk and other similar countries. 

So in some ways I was concerned that this info might be adding pressure that they don’t need, as it would be one more thing for them to think about. But, there was a real hunger for the info, and it was a topic that the teachers had asked me to do some training on following a conversation I’d had with some of them on a previous visit. 

And we also discussed the opposing views regarding the benefits or not of getting a diagnosis. Yes, it can be useful in countries where it can open doors to extra support, but in countries where that isn’t an option, then how necessary is the diagnosis? Instead is it better to empower the teachers to recognise that there might be various reasons why a child is struggling to read, or finds it hard to relate to others, or gets stressed when there is too much sensory overload etc? And then, even if they don’t know the diagnosis behind that child’s presentation, at least the teacher can be more open-minded and creative in thinking how best to support the child.

That was the focus of today’s workshop, and it went really well. The feedback was good, the questions showed lots of deep thinking about real-life applications of the information and the small group discussions were really buzzing. All in all a very good day.