First Day of School!

My school is off the chain! Seriously, I feel so blessed to be at this wonderful primary school! Everyone is so kind and welcoming! My teacher’s name is Connie and she is great! She has been teaching for a long time (there is another teacher there who used to be one of Connie’s students!) She has just taken me under her wing and I know I am going to have a great experience at Greenwood. Today and tomorrow are teacher work days and the students come for their first day on Wednesday. I am a little bit worried about one thing though: they don’t use Fahrenheit, they don’t use pounds, they don’t use inches or miles. I know I can figure out the conversions but I’m a little nervous about having to teach math if I have to do a lesson on metric system or degrees or something like that. Also some of the words are spelled differently here. They don’t really use z’s as much as we do. They write things like organise, recognise, colour. Just typing those three words my spell check automatically changed them to the way that we normally spell them. I’m sure I will have more to say about that as the term progresses. Wish me luck that I won’t look too silly trying to figure it out in front of a bunch of 8 and 9 year olds!

When I got to school this morning I saw the principal right away which was good to see a familiar face. I went to the school last Friday to see if anyone was there and I was able to meet him and he showed me around and told me a little about the school. Anyway, he took me to my classroom to meet Connie. When I got to Connie’s there was a young teacher there (maybe only a year older than me) and her and I connected right away. She was Connie’s student teacher last year and ended up getting a job at the school this year. Her classroom is right across the hall teaching a year 3/4 split class. (She has mainly year 4’s but there are about 6 year 3’s which I think means they are pretty advanced for their age and can be in the same classroom as the 4^th grade) My class is just all year 3 and I think they are expecting about 25-30 students in our class. The school systems are a lot different than ours as far as zoning goes. Basically the principal told me that all of the children in the Greenwood area get first priority to go to Greenwood Primary but if he has room in the school he is not allowed to turn down anyone from another part of town that wants to come to that school.  

After school I went to run some errands with Tracy and Monique to get Monique’s school supplies for the year. The shopping centers here are SO clean! I can’t wait to go shopping soon because everything is so neat and orderly. Even though our malls are clean too, the ones here are just so much better! I don’t know what it is but everything here just seems so much nicer for some reason.  They have this little food place called Pretzels2Go it seems like it is similar to Auntie Annie’s but they have pizza pretzels. The pizza crust is shaped like a pretzel and it has cheese and pepperonis on it. I haven’t tried it yet but hopefully I can soon! Also after school today Catie came over (she is another COST student that lives 2 doors down from me) and we went on a walk around this beautiful lake in the neighborhood. It took us about an hour to walk all the way around it but it was very nice out and we hope to do that every day when we get home from school. We’ll see how long that lasts though J.

I want to thank you all for the comments and emails that you have been sending. I am so blessed to have such wonderful family and friends and I am continuously praying for all of you back home. Since I have been here I have realized how glad I am to be raised in a Christian home. If I didn’t know God, I would not be able to get through this right now. I am so thankful that I have Him to lean on and talk to throughout the day. The devotion that I read every morning seems to have the perfect thing for me to hear for that day. I just can’t express how happy it makes me feel that even though I feel sad that I can’t talk with all of you like I normally do, He is still with me and it is so comforting. I haven’t been to church here yet but Tracy said we are going to a Catholic Church in Freemantle this weekend with one of her best friends.

I hope to be able to Skype soon! The school has wireless and I think I’ll be able to bring my laptop in the morning and use it before school starts. I get to school every morning at 8 but school doesn’t start until 8:45. That will be about 6pm for you all. I will keep y’all posted on that so that I can schedule some Skype dates!

Thanks again for all your prayers, love and support! I love getting your emails and comments, keep ‘em coming!!

Genesis 28:15