Ongoing Projects

Shoubak Children's Library

The Shoubak Public Library is open from 9:00 am to 6:00 pm Saturday through Thusday but is rarely used by people in the surrounding communities. My counterpart, a local school teacher, and I plan to place one hundred and fifty donated children's books in a room set aside by the head of the municipality to be exclusivly for children's books. We want to make this room into a place where children grades first through sixth will want to come to do homework, engage in summer reading clubs, and freely check out books. I have spoken to local schools who have agreed to let my counterpart and I come in to classes each week and "advertise" new books and activiteis that are to take place in the Shoubak Children's Library. Goals are: tTo interest the community in the usefullness of their own library and to create a room in the local Public library to highten the awareness of the importance of reading, provide a place where children will want to share their interests with others, increase their self confidence, and promote literacy.

Al-Mansourah School Magazine

Last semester, my students, counterpart and I published a fall edition of the Al-Mansourah magazine. In it students drew pictures, wrote short essays, English puzzles, recipes, and interviews on the topics of summer break, Ramadan, and Eid Al-Fitr. It was so successful that we'd like to follow it up with a spring edition. However, the cost of self-financing this endeavor drastically limited the number of issues that could be produced. With the help of a Friends of Jordan small projects grant I believe that this year we can make the magazine better and available to all the students who contribute as well as to other schools in the community.

Summer Camp and Garden

The summer camp for Al Turra Secondary School for Girls will focus on pride in one self and one's community. In this case I've indentified the community as the school it self. I believe that if the students actively participate in creating a better learning environment they will begin to take more pride in themelves and their environment. Currently the school has no garden and the walls surrounding the school are in need of improvement. I would like two of the summer camp activities to be building a garden and painting the outer walls of the school with pictures and positive messages. While the students are paying a fee to participate in the camp their money will go to supplies for team building activities, a community mapping project, and transportation fees to a historical site. I was hoping to use the money provided by Friends of Jordan to do a garden and painting project that every student could enjoy, not just the students participating in the camp.

Fun Journeys

During the year, I teach English to 2nd and 3rd graders at my site in the El-Wahadineh Secondary school for boys. I am planning a "Fun and Activities" camp this summer for 15 3rd graders. Half of the time (3 weeks) we will be doing arts & crafts, playing sports, and English lessons, but the other half will be dedicated to activities that they have never done before. For instance, I've met a Jordanian cartoonist in Amman and he has offered his time to come for two days and do cartoon drawings of the kids and teach them how to draw on a basic level. My activities that will require funding will be the field trips. I want to experience something outside of the village and change their normal summer routine. I am planning to take 1 field trip each week, at the end of the week, on Thursday. The two main trips I am planning are to the zoo and an amusement park called "Al-Malahi," both located in Amman. Much of the material in the 3rd grade text books has to do with zoo animals or taking trips to the zoo, and so I want to put that into reality for them. The amusement park is an attempt to provide them with an activity that many American children do every year and find memorable--ride roller coasters, eat popcorn and cotton candy, watch clowns do whatever it is that clowns do that makes us laugh. For these two trips I will have to rent out a school size bus to take us there and get us back in the same day. Their parents have agreed to chip on for the entrance fees, which I've research and found are quite small. The bus for one day from my village costs 55 JD for the entire day, there and back. Since I am potentially taking two trips I am applying for 110 JD, which I guess, with the exchange rate, would be the maximum amount allowable. These two trips will obviously be the highlight of this trip and I can't make it happen without outside funding. The kids are already talking about it every day in class in anticipation and excitement, and I think I have the opportunity to give them a really unique and fun filled summer experience. Yeah!