Thursday, September 25, 2008

Submitted by Sally Deke

“A day well spent – to have lived, loved, learned, and laughed.”

This morning’s gray, cloudy beginning turned into a beautiful sunny day. We had a brief morning meeting and the AM teams left for school, while the PM team members went into town, read by the pool, relaxed and rested, then left for St. Marina School at 1:30.

Our fourth day with children age’s six to ten – approximately – went well. We’ve all adjusted to a slightly chaotic time, since we meet with our students during a casual recreation home work time. The students waiting outside always seem happy to see us. We begin each day with name tags and a song. Today we had a large group activity with all students playing Bingo. After this the seven teachers took places around the room marking our various activities including some using the names of shapes and colors. We added student drawing to our activities today, which the children seemed to like. We’re fortunate to have an artist among us – Gil – and he has been putting drawings on the blackboard that go along with our theme for the day. Today he also drew sketches of individual children, which they LOVED. Some students had us tape their portraits on their shirts or the wall; they proudly took them home. It was a successful (and exhausting) afternoon.

During this time some of the AM teachers took the bus into Heraklion and some purchases were made – two brave souls – Carol and Harry – even went for a swim. We hear it was chilly.
The highlight of the evening was dancing. Sam’s four oldest children modeled Greek dancing and taught us six-step and twelve-step dances. We had varying degrees of success, but we should all be able to dance when we go out for dinner next Wednesday evening. It was another happy day in Crete.