I have spent the past two weeks working for STEP Bulgaria, an organization that works to teach English and business skills to orphans. It has been a crazy ride. I'm working with Group One - the kids who speak hardly any English at all. They range in age from 12 to 17, but most of them are 12-14. They love English classes. I've never worked with kids so enthusiastic to learn. It helps that they're only here for two weeks. So, their optimism and enthusiasm hasn't really run out. We've had a couple of problem kids, but the majority have been amazing. Before we arrived, some of the other volunteers warned us that the kids might be terrible and hard to work with and might steal things from us, etc. Turns out, the other volunteers were wrong. Some of the volunteers seem to be prejudiced against the kids because of their background as orphans, which is a shame since the kids are really quite wonderful. But I've heard some of the volunteers say some fairly negative things about the kids' abilities and intelligence based solely on the fact that they're orphans and poor and therefore "must" be stupid and lazy. In reality, the kids work really hard and have an incredible retention for English. I hear my kids all over the hotel asking the other volunteers "What is your favorite color" or "Where are you from?" They're amazing. I don't get internet in my room, which is why I haven't had the chance to update much in the past two weeks. But I move into my apartment on Friday, and I will hopefully have my internet up and running by next Tuesday. Then, I will have a lot more posts coming!!
I used Tigger to teach the kids prepositions. Tigger was on the table, under the table, etc.
And we used Battleship to teach them letters and numbers.
And the US Ambassador to Bulgaria visited the camp.
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