A snapshot of our kids at the Maldonado school

Over the past 7 weeks, we have grown to be come quite fond of our kids. Chris is assigned the 3rd grade class (9 boys) and I am assigned the 1st and 2nd grade class (12 kids of boys and girls), along with other volunteers - Dorothy & Lisa. The kids each have their own little personality and are amazing to watch.

In the 1st grade, we look after Denilson, Fernando, Carolina & Ruth.

• Carolina is so cute, she adores Chris and jumps all over him. As part of the GVI health program, she now wears glasses. But, she forgets to bring them to school 3 out of 5 days.

• Ruth has a total attention span of 10 seconds max (we are currently helping her read)


• And Fernando requires special mention.... he has a fiery temper and kicks, screams and bites when he doesn´t get his way. He is the reason we need Health Insurance :-)

In the 2nd Grade, we look after 8 kids. Unfortunately, they have a large variance in skill level. They are either really ahead of their grade or really behind. It makes teaching very difficult. My trick to motivating my 1st and 2nd graders is to promise them stickers. They will do ANYTHING for stickers....

My favourite in my 2nd grade class is little Raul aka "Cheeky Monkey". He is so smart. He is not only good at Math in Spanish, he is also very good at numbers in English. Amazing little fella, who comes from a large family of 9 kids!

Also, featured here is Magali and Alejandra.

And this is little Magdalena. She is the bossy one in my 2nd grade, very studious and gets all her work done in record time.

This is Chris´s 3rd grade class. He looks after 9 boys, who are each difficult to motivate to do any work, although they are all really clever especially at Math. Eder, Ivan and Edwin almost never show up to class -they have a tough family life.

This is little Jose from Chris´s 3rd grade class. We try to convince him to remove his cap in class nearly everyday.

Our 4th grade class are the little adults. They are so little and yet have so much responsiblility. My fav is Juanito. He works in the home of a richer family on weekends. He gives me the biggest hug every morning...

This is Viancia , she is new to our school.

Our 5th grade class has a bunch of giggling boys & girls. The are all at that age when everything is funny. The girls "cool girls" and are all very affectionate. This is Soledad and Yovana, all dressed up for the dance competition.

this is our kids performing at the dance competion - they are doin a traditional Peruvian dance.

This is Pablo (middle) and Julio (right) from our 6th grade class. Julio on the right, is the School Head Brigadier and a very quiet and responsible kid. Pablo is the class clown and the one that all the girls have a secret crush on.

Did I forget to mention that we only have 40 kids in 2 classrooms in our school? Grade 1, 2 & 3 sit in the same room. Grade 4, 5 & 6 sit in the same room upstairs. As a result, it is very difficult to teach our kids as everyone is continuously distracted...

But they are a happy bunch... always smiling. They will do anthing for a piece of fruit, a sandwich or a sticker.

Lizelle