Hello everyone! I'm sorry Lent is almost halfway over and I am just now writing in this blog- I've been so busy with immersion week, where I went to my education practicum in a kindergarten class every day for a week, and then a week of volunteering at a school in the Bronx during spring break. But I've been saying/ meditating on our prayer every day, sometimes a few times a day, and it has been really powerful for me!
These past two weeks of experience in the classroom were really important, but not in the ways I thought they would be. I went in looking to learn more about being a teacher, to improve my classroom management skills, to understand child psychology better... But I ended up learning more myself than my students did.
The kids in the Bronx have it so rough. The poverty, violence, and just general depression of those streets are not something I can accurately describe with words. These children didn't ask to be poor. They didn't ask to be born addicted to drugs because their mothers were addicts and used while they were pregnant. They didn't desire to live in a place where they couldn't go outside to play because it's too dangerous. And there I was, worrying when a few kids were speaking out of turn and disrupting the lesson I was trying to teach.
In the grand scheme of things this is nothing. The tiny details of life are not important. In fact, nothing in this life is truly of importance with the exception of love. God is building up His incredible kingdom, and out of love, He is using these impoverished, broken, abused, neglected, lonely children. All that matters is that I learn to love Him, and them through Him, and together we will walk out of the empty promises of this world into a world that is only love.
I went to the Bronx to teach math, English, history, science, art, music... But our Teacher wants us to learn only one subject. Education is so important in this world, and you should of course always have your mind open to learning. But to be ready for our new, eternal, and perfect life with Christ, we must open our hearts instead so that God can teach us to love as He loves.
This is beautiful, Caitrin. Thank you so much for sharing.
ReplyDeleteWhat valuable insight you have gained, even before your "officially" a teacher--your future students will be lucky to have you!
ReplyDeleteAfter reading your post you must must must read, "Breathing Space: A Spiritual journey in the South Bronx" by Heidi Neumark. It's about her life as a pastor of a church in the South Bronx. It's a bunch of little stories that are shuffled into one big story and the good thing about the book is you can pick it up and put it down and not miss much. This may be hard to do but I can tell your busy. Thank you so much for sharing your experience and I really hope you have even more time to reflect on you experience and get to have some Breathing Space :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for the suggestion- I will look into it!!
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