Letter to St. Gregory's School from Sierra Leone

Dear friends at St. Gregory's,

First, thanks so much for the work you did with your students on writing letters, making drawings and sending photos for the students at SLMB school. I shared these with all students in the school over three sessions several weeks apart. I've just returned from the Gbonkolenken Chiefdom where the SLMB school is located and have started to post some photos on the link from my blog (cvangurp2.blogspot.com). With time I will add to these and include more description. Yesterday was "school-feeding" day when a big pot of bulgur is cooked and served with sauce to students and teachers, thanks to the World Food Program, and I enjoyed sharing a meal with the teachers and students. Each time I visit I feel more like it's my school too.

The school itself is quite interesting. It's a five room cement-block and mud and wattle building with one classroom outdoors under palm fronds. Children are often involved in community projects and on the day I arrived, a number of the older students were helping their teachers build a goat pen to house the female goats they received for the goat-breeding project. The community is very involved in the school and whenever I visit, I'll find community members at the school helping in various ways. The community has also joined with the neighbouring village to donate land for the construction of a library, which we hope will happen in the next few years.

After visiting the school, I held a workshop with the volunteer teachers, where we talked about best ways of teaching young children, shared strategies from their and my experiences and discussed how all of this contributes to creating a peaceful climate at school. We plan to make a big pot of "stone soup" for my next visit to celebrate some of the achievements we've made over the year.

Everyone, students and children, really wanted to send individual letters and pictures to St. Gregory's, but I'm not sure yet how to manage this. I did promise to come back with paper and crayons on my next visit and we'll see what we can do. Either I could bring letters when I return in May or we could try to share electronically.

Until then, stay warm and enjoy your students. I have attached a letter that could perhaps be shared with all the classes that sent letters and drawings. Thanks again for all your work and the heart you have put into this exchange.

Best,
Carolyn van Gurp