Training and Orientation

I felt like much of last week was spent in training or orientation. Wednesday afternoon I spent 2 1/2 hours going through the volunteer orientation at the hospital. This covered such exciting things as how volunteer hours are tracked, the dress code (a red polo shirt provided, black pants, shoes and socks...), where to park and how to be reimbursed (the hospital is close enough I can walk), who to contact if you see someone doing something unethical, hospital safety, the meaning of the different "color codes" like "Alert Yellow", "Code Blue", or "Alert Orange" and how each effects volunteers, and how to help prevent the spread of infections (wash your hands!!!). There are still a few more things that need to be accomplished but I should be able to begin volunteering sometime in the next 2 weeks.

I spent 6 hours on Friday getting some training for the tutoring job. A friend of mine thought that sounded like a lot of training. It didn't seem overdone at the time as it was all important information but I was exhausted by the time we finished. The program I'll be working with is brand new so the full-time staff have been putting in some very long hours trying to get everything set up. It was to start this week, but it may not get going until the end of the week or next week. Because of that I do not yet know where I will be placed or the age of my three students. I do know they rank in the bottom 50% of their grade and at least one of them will be an ELL student (i.e. they are learning English at school.)  That will make it an adventure to communicate with their parents. It also makes the extra tutoring that much more important. Students learn better when they get help and encouragement at home. While ELL students may get encouragement at home (their parents did sign them up for this program) they don't get much help because Mom and Dad probably don't speak English very well themselves and even if they do, they may not read it. I have known several families like that and am looking forward to helping some in that situation.

Febuary odds and ends

When I woke up in the middle of the night I remembered that I'd forgotten to write here this past weekend. It's not that nothing happened this past week but I guess I don't really have a good story to tell so here's the bullet list of some of the highlights of the past week.

• Wednesday I finally began jumping through the hoops to volunteer in the therapy department at a nearby hospital. It will be a couple of weeks before I can actually begin since they want to make sure I've never had tuberculosis. Thanks to all my travels, I didn't need any immunizations. I also had my first Chemistry test.
• Friday I spent an enjoyable afternoon with some of my cousins who live in the area.
• Saturday I was finally able to land a job. I'll be tutoring for two months trying to help kids who are lagging behind. More details will be coming once I've been through the training this coming Friday and know where I will be placed.
• Sunday afternoon I played guitar for the first time in church. Afterward I managed to make it home through the snow but had to get out the shovel to be able to get the car into the garage.
• Today I shoveled. As I was working on the sidewalk out front I noticed a young man trying to clear out behind a van with a brush intended to wipe snow off the car. I walked over and offered him my shovel which he gladly took. His mother was very grateful.

Playing With Letters

Every Tuesday and Thursday morning for the past month I've walked a few blocks to a nearby school to play with magnet letters. I sit out in the hallway outside one of the kindergarten rooms with a Ajante.  He's in his second time through kindergarten and he and letters weren't getting along very well.  He had no problem with numbers but some of the letters were not finding a place in his brain.

I started off by giving him a few letters at a time and asking him to find a particular one. One of the tough ones was the M. Our conversation went something like this:
"Have you ever been to McDonalds?"
"Yes"
"Does this look the yellow sign you see outside?"
"Yeah."
For the next few times he would say, "mmmmm, McDonalds, M."
He also decided that the K does look like someone kicking a ball and he has that one down too.

I've been impressed by the progress Ajante has made. In a few weeks he's gone from struggling to know his letters to sounding out words. He does protest when I change the vowel or add a letter to the end. "I don't do 4-letter words. I only do 3-letter words!" But with a little encouragement he gets it. One day I looked at him and said, "You've really been working on this." He just nodded. "Well, keep it up." It's to the point where I may need some help from his teacher in figuring out how to help him learn some of those irregular vowel sounds so common in English - even in those 3 and 4 letter words.

Rembering Eric

Twin Cities Church has been a big part of my beginning to feel more at home in Minneapolis.  (I wrote about it here.)  There is a big emphasis on us being a family.  One of the obvious ways we live this out is by eating a meal together every Wednesday evening before we spend time studying the Bible and praying together.  Since I have Chemistry on Wed evening I get there about an hour late.  There is always some food left for me but I miss the interaction and banter around the table.

This past week there were two other things that showed how serious the church is about being family.   Last Sunday after the service, the pastor called a family meeting to deal with an issue that had come up.  Some family matters are kept in the family so I'll not tell that story here.  Suffice it to say that it was a hard conversation even for a newbie like me, but within a few days the result of that conversation was positive.

The other family event was Eric's funeral.  I didn't know Eric very well.  In fact, I never had a conversation with him beyond greetings.  But when I received the message that Brandon's friend, Eric, had been found dead, I knew who he was.  The two of them were always together.  They were such good friends from the age of 7 that Brandon was listed with the family in the obituary.  From what I've been able to piece together, Eric's family didn't have much to do with God and he ended up getting into drugs.  Brandon continued to be his friend and prayed often for him.  A motorcycle accident that should have been his death was a turning point for Eric.  In November he called Brandon's sister who lives in Arizona and she could hardly believe it was the same Eric.  He talked about how he had tried to read the Bible before but it had never made sense.  Now when he read it he understood it and he was excited about what he was reading.  He came to church with Brandon and the change was evident to those who knew him.  He didn't say much during our discussions but his countenance had changed.  Jesus had given him hope.  Believing in Jesus doesn't mean life is easy or that we no longer make mistakes or sin.  Eric sinned when he spent some cash he'd received on drugs and overdosed.  That sin cost him his life at the age of 25.  How thankful we are for God's grace and mercy that continues past the final earthly acts of those who believe in him.  Without that grace and mercy there is no hope.

On Friday afternoon Eric's new church family gathered with his family and friends who had known him much longer than we had.  Quite a few people from church were there.  Almost everyone who is part of our Wednesday home group came to remember, to support Brandon and to pray for Eric's family and friends who are grieving without hope.  That's what family does.