Saying Goodbye

July 25th was my last day at site. I packed up my stuff, said a few more goodbyes, got into a share taxi that happened to be passing by transporting a few hikers into town from Mulanje, and I was off.

It's hard to believe that two years have come to a close, and that I won't be seeing my friends and neighbors and the village everyday anymore. As I looked out the window at the rolling hills, the brick houses, the women filling buckets at the borehole, the children playing at the side of the road, I couldn't help but feel sad to say goodbye to my village and my home of the last two years.

Goodbye, Village

Goodbye, School

Goodbye, Mountains

Goodbye, Neighbors

Goodbye Other Neighbors. Goodbye, cow.

Everyone was so sweet when we were saying our goodbyes, and they all wanted to know when I would be back. I had to answer "kaya" (who knows?) because it's hard to know what the future holds. But Malawi will always hold a special place in my life, and I would love to come back again someday.

Last Bell! :oD

May 31st was the last day of school, aka "Last Bell". Similar to First Bell (1st day of school) it is a day of celebration, speeches (by staff, students, the local priest, mayor, etc.), songs, etc. 

Below is the 9th grade graduating class.

Here is the 1st grade class (youngest in the school).

After all the speeches and diplomas, the 9th graders walk around encircled by all the other classes.

Then they release their balloons into the air.

Left-to-right: me, Natalia (my main partner teacher), Iuliana (the director), a dude i don't know ;op, and the priest.

This is my FAVORITE student, Grigore. He was in my 6th grade class.

This is Marin. He was the first student to befriend me outside of class. He's a sweetie.

Me with some of the cleaning crew (who were super cool ladies).

As with most (all?) school celebrations, flowers are essential.

My speech that Mama-G helped me write.

Dear Teachers and dear students,
It has already been 2 years! I think it has gone by very quickly. Thank you for your collaboration and for allowing me to teach health education. It has been a great honor for me to work with my parteners, Mrs. Natalia and Mrs. Elena, and with all of my dear students. Thank you for your hospitality, patience, and kindness towards me. Everyone here, including Mrs. Iuliana, Mrs. Valentina, Mrs. Nina, and all the teachers and staff, and of course, every student, has become a part of my heart, with memories i will have for my whole life. I have beautiful memories from Vasilcău, and from all of Moldova. If i said something wrong or incorrectly, excuse me, but i want everyone to always have beautiful memories. I wish everyone health and success in everything! I hope to return again. Thank you beautifully!

Another good day in Malawi

Life as a PCV is full of ups and downs. It is easy to complain about how hard it is to be here, living in less than ideal conditions, thousands of miles away from my loved ones. If everyday was difficult, I don't know how long I would last here. Thankfully, there are good days here too, and they keep me motivated and feeling like what I am doing here is worthwhile.

This blog post is about one of those good days. This particular day happened last year when I was still teaching Biology (and I forgot to post it), but it's also a good representation of what it's like for me as an Education Volunteer in Malawi.

I arrived at school a little before 7:30 and started preparing for my first lesson. I had a double period of Physical Science to teach. We are learning about the three states of matter. I brought in a lot of materials to use for demonstrations, like a jar, a cup of water, a box of matches, a bottle filled with beans and a stick of incense. The incense was to demonstrate how gas molecules move freely and do not have a fixed shape or volume. When I lit the incense, the class got really excited. When I was finished with the demo, I asked if I should put it out, but they said no because they liked the smell. At the end of class, they asked if I could bring incense to our next class too!

Later in Biology class we were finishing up our unit on respiration. I went over the four adaptations of respiratory systems for their functions, and then asked the students to work in groups and tell me how each adaptation applied to the specific respiratory systems of humans, fish and insects. I have tried activities like this before, and they have not gone well, but today the students all worked quickly and efficiently to complete the activity. After class, I saw students going up to copy the diagrams and make sure they copied down the answers to the activity. That made me feel good.

I noticed that a few of the students were milling around outside about half an hour later, and I asked if there was a teacher in their class. They said no because the teacher had just given them notes to copy, and they were finished. I had a couple videos about respiration in fish, so I took the students in groups of 10 to another classroom to watch the video on my laptop. Afterwards, they thanked me for showing them the video.

I didn't have anymore classes to teach after that, but I decided to take advantage of the free time to work in the library. I am the Co-Librarian, and we just received a large shipment of books that needed to be arranged. While I was there, a few students dropped by to chat, teachers came in to borrow books for their classes, and I talked with a teacher about how she can use the new books for her subjects.

By 2:45pm I was ready to head home. I said goodbye to the teachers and then headed over to the market to buy some bread and potatoes. On the way I greeted a lot of people, as you do in Malawi. When I got to my house, the neighbor kids asked if they could draw with me. I said no because I was tired. And I was. But after I went inside, changed clothes, made a quick lunch and read the news a bit, I decided to invite the kids over. We sat on my porch, drawing with crayons, reading my Chichewa book, and listening to Yusef (one of the kids) singing.

Some of my "iwes" aka the neighbor kids that keep my home life busy and interesting

Then we went to check on the garden (Note: the photo above is more recent, so the garden looks a lot different than when I originally wrote this blog post). I let the kids pick a few cucumbers and radishes, much to their delight. You would think it was candy-- they were so excited! They helped me weed a little bit, and we put the weeds into the compost pile. Then I grabbed the leftover sugarcane I had bought yesterday to share with them. I wasn't sure how to break it, but no worries-- the 9-year old used a machete. (I spent the whole time fretting she would cut her fingers off, even though the children wield knives when they are three years old here). As we sat munching sugarcane, I was just overcome with this sense of contentment.

Farewell to the Library Monitors

We had our final Library Monitors meeting at school this week. The Library Monitors are a program I created at my school where two students in each grade level are trained in how to use the library, and then assist me each week during their class’s library time. The kids have done a great job all year, and have really taken on a proactive role in the library. They go around and help the students find books, they put away the returned books, they make sure there aren’t too many students in the library at one time, and they come to me to reschedule library periods that fall during a school holiday. Plus they translate for me a lot, which really helps me out. Library has been my favorite part of my service, and they have been a huge part of that. So our last meeting was more about celebrating them and thanking them for being so amazing!

Since it was our last meeting, I started them off with a little library quiz. I divided them into two teams, and gave them a list of questions to answer using the books in the library. Both teams finished in about 20 minutes, then we went through the answers for both—perfect scores! I was so proud of them.

Next came the the certificates. I made certificates for each of them, with the hours they worked in the library as well as their training hours listed. I gave them a little speech about the importance of their role in the library, and how much I appreciated them, and how I hoped they would continue to work hard next year after I am gone. Then I gave the certificates to my Co-Librarian Mr. Kapira, and he shook their hands and gave them out. He also thanked me for all my work in the library, which meant a lot to me.

The Library Monitors showing off their certificates

Then it was time for biscuits and Fanta! Because in Malawi, you can’t have a meeting without biscuits and Fanta. (Side note—this is different than a party in Malawi, which means chicken and rice and Fanta, plus lots of music and dancing.) While they were enjoying their refreshments, I passed around a bunch of free magazines that I had gotten from Peace Corps during my service, including the Peace Corps Times and Worldview magazine. I let each student pick one to keep. They really liked them, and asked me questions about some of the articles and pictures. One student saw an ad for Geico with the gecko logo on it, and asked me what that was. So I told them it was a gecko, similar to the house geckos we have here in Malawi. Then they taught me the word for gecko in Chichewa, which is “nalimata”.

We took some group photos of them, and I promised that I would print one to put up on the library bulletin board. This is the one I think I am going to go with:

And that was our meeting. Thanks for all your hard work, kids!

Potato, Potahto

During the first week of each new term I am supposed to record the final grades for my students. As I tally grades between my spreadsheet and my hard copy mark book, I always have to do the reconciliation of names. This happens every term and it drives me absolutely crazy. Who knew how difficult it would be just to record a score for the right student? This is a problem here in Malawi for several reasons.

1) It seems like all kids here have between 3-4 names, and they randomly switch between them on homework, quizzes and exams. One kid will go by one name the whole term, then on his exam will use a different combination of names (like the first name and then one of their middle names, without their surname) and totally throw me off. It doesn't help that certain names like Precious, Chisomo (which means Grace), Mphatso (which means gift) and John are common here, so you can't always figure out who is who if you only recognize one name.

2) Kids also like to switch between the English and Chichewa versions of their name (like Mphatso and Gift), so sometimes I have to use my Chichewa dictionary to record a homework assignment. This is a good way to learn new Chichewa words, I guess. But annoying when you are working under a deadline.

3) The kids also switch up the spellings of their names. They will add letters or subtract letters, seemingly on a whim. Based on my observations, there is no one correct way to spell your name in Malawi.  I see this happen with students as well as with the teachers. I'm not really sure why.
= Maybe it is because Chichewa is considered more a spoken language than a written one, so spelling isn't considered as important? For example, I've seen three different spellings alone for n'gaiwa, the whole-grain maize which is a staple food here in Malawi.
-Plus in Chichewa the "l" and the "r" are interchangeable.  You can literally pronounce either one with an "l" or an "r" sound. That makes spelling those words a challenge. Which makes recording grades a nuisance for me.

The coolest example of a student changing their spelling was a girl with the surname "Leonard". She always spells it like that now, but on my intial attendance sheet the first day of class she spelled it Lynard, like Lynard Skynard. I don't think she knows who they are, but it made me smile.

A sidenote on spelling of names-- I tried using the school register lists during the first term to get the correct spellings, but those were actually worse. The way kids register for school is that a parent meets with the Form Teacher, and verbally provides the parent's name, student name, student age and the village where they live.  Since it is all verbal, the teachers that register the students just spell the name however it sounds to them. I never hear any confirmation of the spelling. (The l/r things comes up big time during school registration. I see lots of Arfreds). So trying to make out the messy scrawls of my students on their notebooks is actually more accurate. Maybe. All in all though, it's not a big deal because the spelling of names just doesn't matter here.  Well, to anyone except to me.

4) Kids like to write nicknames on their notebooks, and then all of a sudden pull out their real name on the last exam. That happened just recently with a student that had gone by "Junior" all term. Then all of a sudden he writes "Raphael" on his exam, and I was wondering who this new student was, until I saw the common surname. And saw that Junior was missing a final exam score. You have to be Sherlock Holmes to be a teacher here.

5) The class roster changes a lot. Kids change school a lot here, and there is no formal communication to the teachers of this. In a class of 80 students where only 1/2 to 3/4 show up on a regular basis, it is hard to know who is missing or new. So when I have a student that did not take a test, I don't know if they were absent, changed schools, or just randomly changed the name they wrote on their paper. It can be frustrating.

Here are some examples of the ways kids change up their names:

• Blessings Chimanga vs Blessings Chimanga Hornest vs Ernest Mphatso Chimanga (adding in new names, dropping others later-- why????)
• Supuni, Spoon (switching between the Chichewa name and the English translation)
• Justin, Justine (adding in an extra letter)
• Swally, Mswali (changing spelling)
• Vincent, Vinsenti (changing spelling, adding a letter)
• One of my students just wrote "Lee Gangsta" on his notebook, but that turned out to be just his nickname.  Yeah, thanks. You are getting a zero, buddy. Just kidding...

So my mark book is full of cross-outs, and my spreadsheet has an extra column for "Other Names" and somehow I get by. It's funny because I used to be such a stickler for spelling people's names correctly. I considered it a matter of politeness and respect. But I have been living in Malawi so that has required me to adapt to my host country while I am here. So in that spirit, I spell my name different here too (Stesi).  And I even switch between the English spelling and the Chichewa spelling of my name a lot, which really confuses the other PCVs, but the Malawians don't seem to mind. Integration!

School Librarian

I love books. Some of my happiest memories from childhood were going to the book fair at school, or getting the new Scholastic book catalog in my elementary school classes. I also loved going to the public library, and usually walked out with a huge stack of books. So working in the library at school has been a dream come true for me. My work is in the library at school is one of my primary projects, and one that I have put a lot of time and energy into over the past two years.

When I first arrived at my school they told me I would be the Librarian. It started out pretty simple-- just opening the library for students during the morning breaks, and keeping track of the books they were checking out. Then I noticed there were books that were not being used by the students, and I wanted to rearrange the library to encourage their use. I also noticed that the students liked to review past JCE and MSCE exams (similar to our SAT and ACT in the U.S.), but they were all out of order and the students couldn't find the right ones, so I decided to organize those. And it just kept going from there.

Some of the projects I have worked on at our school library are:

• Creating a list for each class of the student names and numbers so we can expedite the check-out process
• Organizing a library raffle at the end of the term to reward students who turn in their books on time
• Organizing all of the subject syllabi so teachers can use them for their schemes and lesson planning
• Organizing all books by subject and then by level e.g. Biology subdivided into Junior and Senior level and labeling the bookshelves with that information
• Working with a bookbinder to get books repaired, and purchasing masking tape to bind all the torn books
• Numbering and organizing the huge shipment of books we received from the Ministry of Education
• Encouraging teachers to utilize multiple books for their classes, and to bring books into the classrooms for their lessons
•  Encouraging student use of dictioniaries and encyclopaedias
• Creating library periods for each form, so the classes get 40 minutes instead of 15 minutes to use the library. This way instead of just scrambling to find a book before the bell, they actually have time to browse and ask questions.

The project I am most proud of though has got to be the Library Monitor system. Previously our school had two Library Prefects in Form 4, who were in charge of assisting in the library.  I created the position of two Library Monitors in each Form, so now our school has a total of six Library Monitors and two Library Prefects. These students have the duties of assisting me in the library during their Form’s assigned library periods. They met with me on Friday afternoons during the first term and I trained them in the library, abut the rules and the organization, how to use dictionairies, encyclopaeidias and atlases and the use of indexes, glossaries and table of contents to find the information they needed.

Now library periods go really smoothly. One Library Monitor mans the door and makes sure there are no more than five students in the library at a time. The other walks around, assisting students and putting away books that are returned. This allows me to assist students with checking in and checking out books and past papers. This works well on so many levels. The students that don’t speak English well are more comfortable asking questions of the Library Monitors in Chichewa than asking me, and I can have the Library Monitors translate things for me if needed. They are also my library spokespeople for their class, so if say we need ot reschedule a library period due to a holiday, I can just work with the library monitors to try to find the best time. The Library Monitor program has been a huge success, and has made my experience as Librarian really meaningful. Best of all, these students will retain what they have learned about the library, and hopefully they will continue to pass it on to students and teachers after I am gone.

Educație pentru Sănătate certificate :o]

I made certificate de realizare (certificates of achievement/diplomas) for my students and partner teachers. Below is an example (for one of my partner teachers). The kids, my partners, my school director, and adjunct directors LOVED them! :o] The triangle in the background is „Triunghiul de sănătate” (The Triangle of Health), which includes physical, mental, and social health. It was what i used as the foundation for my 2 years of teaching Health Ed. 

On the bottom it says, "Mesajul de sănătate: „Sănătatea este o stare de completă bunăstare fizică, mentală, și socială, și nu doar absența bolii sau infirmității.”" (The health message: "Health is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.") Every class we had a health message, basically summarizing the topic of the day in 1 or 2 sentences that the students wrote in their notebooks. The quote I used on the diplomas is a definition of health that was their very first health message and was taped to the wall for the whole 2 years.

Below is my 5th grade class with my partner teacher, Elena. :o]

The rest of my classes (6th-9th) i teach with my partner teacher, Natalia. Below is our 7th grade class with Natalia near the center with the pink scarf. :o]

Here should be my 8th grade class photo, but i forgot :o[... I'll try to get them together next week on the last day of school.

This is my 6th grade class, whom i love dearly. They were my worst class last year, but this year the school split them into 2 classes, so i got the privilege of being able to teach this class. They went from my worst to my very very BEST class! I love them and will truly miss them! Natalia and i are standing on the far right. 

Left-to-right: Alina, Alexandra, Nicoleta, Tudora, Lilia, Ion T., Vlad, Vadim, Grigore (my very favorite student :o]), Marionela, Valeriu, me, Natalia. 2 of my students, Cristian, and Ion G. weren't there yesterday. 

And lastly, our 9th graders. 

Overall, all my classes were pretty great (7th grade was my worst this year, but i still liked them individually...just as a class, they were pretty chaotic).

I'm so grateful that i had the opportunity to teach health ed for the past 2 years. I've always wanted to be a teacher, and now i can say, that after teaching for 2 years in a foreign language, that i really do LOVE teaching! I'd love to have the opportunity to teach in my native tongue...maybe someday :o]

Lesson on Discrimination

My partner teacher and i taught a lesson about discrimination that proved surprisingly effective. While researching effective ways to teach about discrimination to middle-schoolers, i came across an experiment done by a teacher (Jane Elliott) in the 1960's called Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes Exercise (found at JaneElliott.com) that i decided to try out in my classes. She did her experiment over 2 class periods, but i had to condense it into 1 class period. 

So we started the class by having everyone stand up and instructed all the brown-eyed kids to move to the back of the class for the entire class and all the blue-eyed (or everyone without brown eyes) kids move to the front. 

Then we started our lecture as usual, by giving stickers to those who wrote in their "Grateful Journals" and did their homework...but we ignored all the brown-eyed kids. The brown-eyed kids became very upset, which set the tone for the rest of the class. 

After we gave stickers, we asked for 7 volunteers...and again ignored the brown-eyed kids. The 7 volunteers were each given a different name tag to wear (poor kid, mother without a husband, pregnant woman, black person, Gypsy, gay, doctor). Then we read about 20 statements out and asked them to step forward if they thought the statement applied to the name tags they were wearing or not (for example, "You live in a house with internet access and cable TV"; "You've never been discriminated against"; "You are not afraid to be stopped on the street by police"; "You have the right to vote"; "You can choose your own profession"; etc.). Then we asked why they did or didn't step forward.

Then we defined and discussed what discrimination is, what a stereotype is, different forms of discrimination (race, sexual orientation, age, gender, religion, handicaps). etc. 

After that we handed out the above-mentioned types of discriminations to groups of 4 to have them role play what they might look like. The brown-eyed kids refused to partcipate, saying since they hadn't been included during the whole class, they weren't going to do the assignment. I had mixed feelings about their response. On the one hand i was glad that they were seemingly truly understanding what if feels like to be discriminated against (which was the whole point of the brown-eyes vs. blue eyes), but on the other hand they knew what the class was about and i found it interesting that even though they knew they were being discriminated against for the purpose of the class, that didn't matter, they were still upset and unwilling to participate.

So, after the role-playing, i then spoke to the brown-eyed kids and asked them how they felt after being discriminated for the whole class. They all said they were upset and angry. Then i asked the blue-eyed kids how they felt as witnesses to such discrimination against their classmates and friends. They said it was unfair (but none of them spoke up during the experiment, interestingly). 

Then we ended the class with a demonstration. I had 1 brown and 1 white egg. I asked them what the difference was. They said the colors. Then i cracked them open into a bowl and asked them if there was still a difference. They said they were the same. I said that's how people are too...we may look different on the outside, but we're all made of the same parts. 

Then, because i felt bad for the brown-eyed kids, and because they were still sore about the whole thing, i let them choose from the goody bag...so, i ended it by discriminating against the blue-eyed kids...opa! ;op

Easter Egg Hunt!

This year Easter celebrated in America and elsewhere in the world was on March 27, but Orthodox Easter (which most Moldovans observe) is on May 1. 

I decided to have an Easter egg hunt with all of my classes to celebrate non-Orthodox Easter. Thanks to my American peeps (no pun intended), i was able to do so cuz they sent me the plastic eggs (about 150 of them), American candy, and even peeps! I also included slap bracelets (thank you again America), Moldovan candies, 7 lei per class (in 1 leu bills), $1USD per class, stickers, and free points. All the kids had a blast! :oD

Here was my set-up. It took quite awhile to fill all those eggs!

This is my 9th grade class with my partner, Natalia in the white on the left. They were my last class of the day and 3 of my 6th grade boys came back before the 9th graders came, as i was still hiding the eggs, and stole some of them, including the one with the $1USD! I was sooooooooooo mad! So for punishment i took away any points they got from the eggs and made them apologize in person to the 9th grade class...they were so embarrassed! Overall, it was a succes!

Valentine's Day (ziua îndragostiților)

For Valentine's Day i taught some history/legends of how Valentine's came to be and how we celebrate it in America. Moldovans celebrate Valentine's Day too, like with all Moldovan holidays, there is Valentine's Day, similar to the American holiday, and then there is the religious observance day of celebrating St. Valentine himself. There is another holiday in Moldova, also in February, called Dragobete, and it's the day they celebrate romantic love.

After a brief history, all my students decorated pre-cut Valentine hearts i cut for them and i put them up on the wall. After they finished decorating, i gave them more construction paper to write a Valentine to someone...i received about 10. :o]

Casual Day

Today was Casual Day at my school. That means students are allowed to wear  their regular clothes to school instead of their usual uniforms. This was a fundraiser to raise money for our sports team.

Each student was required to contribute K50 - K200 depending on their outfit. If they just wore jeans and a t-shirt, they would pay K50. Or if they wore denim cutoffs, a black t-shirt, a red bandanna and black sunglasses, like one of my students, they had to pay more (that ensemble cost him K150).

A good number of students took advantage of the opportunity to wear regular clothes. I saw lots of sideways ball caps, girls with National Wear (dresses and skirts and blouses made out of chitenjes), and sunglasses. One girl even shaved a design into her hair, which is not allowed normally. So they really had fun with it.

There were still quite a few students that wore their uniforms today. Those students were still required to pay K50 though. Failure to pay resulted in those students being sent home. I guess compulsory donations are one way to show commitment to school sports. Not sure how that would go over in America though.

Teaching about American Christmas

Out of the 5 American holidays i decided to teach about this school year, Christmas was the 3rd/5 (I already taught about Halloween and Thanksgiving, and next will teach about Valentine's Day and American Easter).

In the beginning of the lesson i did a comparison with the kids about the similarities and differences between Moldovan and American Christmas traditions. I handed out a worksheet with 20 sentences and together we read through the list and wrote an "M" if it was Moldovan, "A" for American, and "MA" for both.

Here's the list:

1) Christmas is celebrated to honor the birth of Christ. "MA"

2) Christmas is celebrated on two dates: December 25 and January 7. "M"

(Due to strict Soviet restrictions of celebrating religious holidays, Soviet countries started secretly celebrating Christmas on January 7. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, January 7 (aka "Old" or "2nd" Christmas) is still recognized as Christmas, especially to the older generations who lived through the old Soviet times. December 25 is aka "New" or "1st" Christmas. Not all Moldovans celebrate both Christmases - it's usually one or the other.)

3) Santa leaves gifts under the Christmas tree. "MA"

4) Santa gets into the house to deliver presents by going down the chimney. "A"

5) People fast from animal products for 6 weeks before Christmas. "M"

(Not all Moldovans fast before Christmas, only the very religiously devout usually.)

6) Christmas is only celebrated on December 25, but Christmas Eve (December 24) is a special night of feasting and opening of a gift for some families. "A"

7) The Christmas season begins the day after Thanksgiving and lasts through December 31. "A"

8) Christmas carols are sung door to door, mostly by children who receive candy and money from the homeowners. "M"

("Colindă" or "Christmas Caroling" happens at least 4 separate days - 1st New Year's Eve (Dec 31), Old Christmas (Jan 7), Old New Year's Eve (Jan 13), and Old New Year's (Jan 14). It reminds me a lot of Trick-or-Treating in The States because kids dress up in masks and robes, go door-to-door, and instead of saying "Trick-or-Treat!" the sing traditional Moldovan Christmas carols and receive candy and money in their sacks.)

9) Children write letters to Santa Claus. "MA"

10) People go to church. "MA"

11) The Christmas season usually starts on December 31 with the decorating of the Christmas tree ("bradul Crăciun") and lasts until January 15 (the day after "Old" New Year's). "M"

12) Christmas carols are sung door-to-door, mostly by adults, who do not receive candy or money - they just do it to spread Christmas joy. "A"

13) Mulled wine and champagne are popular during the Christmas season. "MA"

14) Another name for Santa Claus is "Ded Moroz". "M"

(Apparently this is more of a Russian thing, it means "Father Winter".)

15) The Christmas tree is decorated usually in early December. "A"

16) Popular foods at Christmastime are eggnog, peppermint, chocolate, cookies, candy canes, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and gingerbread. "A"

(In Moldova, especially after fasting from animal products for 6 weeks, it is common for Moldovans to kill and eat a pig at Christmas, breaking the fast.)

17) If the children are naughty, they get coal in their stockings. "A"

18) On St. Nicholas' Day (Dec 6 or Dec 19, depending on the locality), children leave clean shoes or boots at the door or window to get small gifts from Santa Claus. "M"

(Moldovans are extremely strict about clean shoes.)

19) The Christmas tree is usually decorated on December 31, the night that Santa Claus leaves small gifts underneath it for children to find on the morning of January 1st. "M"

(It is common for children to sleep next to the bradul Crăciun to try to see Santa leaving their gifts.)

20) The children leave milk and cookies near the Christmas tree for Santa. "A"

After i taught them about the traditions of an American Christmas, i had them trace and cut out their hands on green paper that i made into a Christmas tree (my 9th grade class is missing because they didn't come to class that day, so the tree is smaller than i had hoped). Then i gave them pre-cut round ornaments to decorate, to decorate the tree with. 

The drawings i added around the tree (including the star at the top) were from the review game i made „Calea Curcubeului: Crăciun ediție” (The Way of the Rainbow: Christmas edition).

International Day of Peace (Ziua Internațională a Păcii)

Sooooooooo, this is REALLLLLLY late, but wutevz...

I taught about the International Day of Peace way back in September (the official day is Sept.21 -- happy b-day mom!), but am just now getting around to posting it!

I started with a definition of peace ("Peace is a time of security and tranquility that exists when there is no fighting or war, all coexisting in perfect harmony and freedom."). Then I explained what The International Day of Peace celebrates and it's history (InternationalDayOfPeace.org).

From there i showed and explained different symbols of peace from around the world, starting, of course with The Peace Corps' logo and my role as a PCV.

Upon researching different peace symbols, i learned a few things myself, like where the shape of the most recognized peace symbol comes from. It was a logo designed for the UK campaign for nuclear disarmament, in 1958 by Gerald Holtom, and adopted by anti-war and counterculture in the United States and elsewhere.

The symbol is a combination of the semaphore signals for the letters "N" and "D," standing for "nuclear disarmament". In semaphore the letter "N" is formed by a person holding two flags in an inverted "V," and the letter "D" is formed by holding one flag pointed straight up and the other pointed straight down. Superimposing these two signs forms the shape of the center of the peace symbol.

"V" is for "Victory". That's how this famous hand gesture got started. It was used to represent victory during WWII. In the '60s, anti-war protesters adopted it to represent peace from the Vietnam War. Both uses represent the desire for the end of war.

The olive branch represents the restoration of peace. The dove from Noah's Ark brought back an olive branch, which showed that The Flood was receding, and therefore, God's wrath subsiding, bringing peace back to earth.

The dove is what brought the olive branch back to The Ark. Commonly the dove and olive branch are symbolized together, with the dove carrying the olive branch in it's beak.

The Roerich Emblem - I had never seen this symbol before, but thought it appropriate for Moldovans because it was designed by a Russian cultural activist, Nicholas Roerich, who used it as the emblem for his movement to protect cultural artifacts.

In 1935 a pact initiated by Roerich was signed by the United States and Latin American nations, agreeing that "historic monuments, museums, scientific, artistic, educational and cultural institutions" should be protected both in times of peace and war.

Roerich described the circle as representing the totality of culture, with the three dots being Art, Science, and Religion, three of the most embracing of human cultural activities. He also described the circle as representing the eternity of time, encompassing the past, present, and future.

The Peace Flag - The international peace flag in the colors of the rainbow was first used in Italy on a 1961 peace march from Perugia to Assisi organised by the pacifist and social philosopher Aldo Capitini.

The flag commonly has seven rainbow-colored stripes with the word "Peace" in the center. It has been explained as follows:

In the account of the Great Flood, God set the rainbow to a seal the alliance with man and nature, promising that there will never be another Flood over the whole earth. The rainbow thus became a symbol of Peace across the earth and the sky, and, by extension, among all men.

Then for homework, the kids drew their own peace symbols.

Our classroom Wall of Peace! :o]