Light of Hope is where we are staying for most of our trip; working in classrooms, painting and getting to know the kids.

I heard I was going to teach basic forms of transport to the 5/6 and 7/8 class and felt so unprepared. I felt like I had absolutely no qualification to do this. About two hours before we set up in the classroom, all the people teaching that day met in an air-conditioned room to prepare. We had tubs full of material, diligently prepared by Mrs Pitt, which we could sift through and teach. If it wasn’t for materials, I would have been completely hopeless. My teaching partner was Y-tam. We talked and planned activities to fill the full hour. We threw ideas around and both agreed on one thing, we would have fun. No matter how many times we did something, if the kids enjoyed it, we would do it again.We went over and over our material and all seemed fine.

Class was about to start and the kids began to flood in, the nerves kicked in. They were only kids, what was the worst they could do? We started the lesson with greetings and I immediately regretted ever feeling nervous. The kids were so warm and inviting. We had participation from the get go. The only problem was the greetings only lasted for a few minutes and we had a whole hour to fill. We improvised a lot! Flipping from activity to activity felt unprepared but as soon as I started to focus on the kids, my mindset changed. I looked around the room and saw laughter; I heard them learning what we were teaching - we had accomplished our original goal. The first half went slowly but the second half flew. We had done it and had an awesome time along the way.

I cannot describe how it feels to leave a class and have the kids follow you around and want to get to know you. After teaching in the classroom I sat and observed the way that these people interacted with each other. The sense of community here is immeasurable.

Although I haven't personally been involved, the mural on the boys toilet block is really coming along. On Thursday the blue base was painted and the first strands of green grass were painted on Friday. The sketches already look great!

Our afternoons have also been packed playing the Light of Hope kids' two favourite sports - soccer and volleyball. It's been great fun but also very (VERY) muddy.

In some ways I’ve felt like an intruder here, until a child comes up to ask questions to get to know you, that’s when I really feel valued. Even if what we were doing wasn’t too grand, I can always look back on moments in class where I was able to make at least one student’s life better if only for a brief moment.