Thursday 15th August- Last day teaching before Summer School

Today was my last day at Kindergatten School before Summer school starts on Monday. We knew all the kids at school had exams until 1 o clock so we stayed at the lodge until 12:30, having a lay in and doing some preparation work in our groups for Summer School.

Kya having her hair played with by some of her and my class.

At 12:30, the 4 of us got into a VU van in our Kindergatten staff shirts and headed to the school. We had bought a big cake for the staff and had lots of small gifts in our bags for our classes. We arrived at the school and headed into the staff room where the teachers all hugged and thanked us, we also met the chairman again, whose son (Moses) is in my P4 class, as well as the chairman we met for the first time the director of the school, who had come in personally to congratulate and thank us for our work.

Our huge meal laid on by the school.

Once the introductions were made a huge lunch was brought out by the staff for us all to eat. We had plates of Posho, Mitoki, Rice, Avocados, Bananas, and bowls of beans and pork in a lovely tomato sauce as well as lots of sodas. Once we had eaten our food, the staff brought out a cake that they had made us, and we brought out ours for the staff. We all did a lot of dancing and cut both cakes, a lot of our cake was still left by the time we had finished due to its size, so P3, P4, P5 and P6 were led in so that they could all have some. After the cake we had a leaving assembly, where the teachers, the head teacher, chairman and director gave speeches before giving us certificates. Katie stood and gave a really nice speech of her own as she had been at the school the longest out of the group of us, and got very emotional towards the end. Once the speeches and talks were over, our classes were brought in and they danced and sang to us all.

Handing James and Ronald from my class cake

By 3 o clock, the assembly was all over and we were allowed to go to our classrooms to spend time with our classes. When I arrived in my class I found that my class had written thank you messages to me on the blackboard. I handed out sweets to my whole class as well as a couple of toy cars and lots of small bits and bobs. Pav had lent me his portable speakers so I played music to my class, and then brought my class over to Siobhan’s P3 class as her room was bigger so that both classes could play Musical bumps for a bit. My class then went back to our P4 room where we played some more games and danced to music for a bit before going outside to play football. As we were about to leave, my favourite student (and oldest at 13 among a class of mainly 10 year olds) Maxim came over and gave me a big bag of bananas. I was so pleased by this as when I got P4 class I was told about Maxim being unintelligent and a trouble maker, and, as a result I had put a lot of attention on Maxim to try and help him improve, he’s also by far the best footballer in P4 and probably the school.

BALLOONS!

Maxim and his Charlton shirt.

We went and played football for 45 minutes and listened to music as we played. When the bell rang for the end of the day a couple of students not only from my class came over and gave me some letters. One of my students, Shivon, also came over and gave me two 8 foot high sugar canes as I was heading back to the staff room. On my way to the staff room I told Maxim to come with me so that I could give him a gift without the rest of the class crowding around. I found my bag in the staff room and brought out my old Charlton from a few seasons ago which I gave to him. I was pleased to see how happy Maxim was by the gift and he instantly put the Charlton shirt on. I was very sad to leave my class and school as all the students waved goodbye as myself, Kya, Katie and Siobhan headed to our van, but all the students should hopefully be at the summer school on Monday as its set at Kindergatten this year.

Back at the lodge people were already getting ready to celebrate Sam’s 22^nd birthday, for dinner we had a really good meal of rice, goat and potatoes followed by yet another cake. After dinner we started drinking and partying to celebrate not only Sam’s birthday but also Siobhan’s excellent A level results.

Best present ever!