Classroom supplies: a big thank-you!

I have been sorting classroom supplies donated by many students and families at New Searles School. For the last month or so of school, I kept getting little visitors stopping by my classroom to drop off supplies. Many times a mom or a child's teacher would remark to me that their child wanted to bring something for the kids in Kenya. I always love it when it you can tell that a students is affected in some way by the stories and videos I showed a class. So a big thanks to the New Searles school family. It is fun going through so many things and knowing that some child or family wanted to help another child on the other side of the world.These photos only show about 1/2 of the donations.

I am very thankful for all donations. It will be wonderful to bring so many supplies for the schools. I did want to mention one donation. One of my students sold a bunch of his old toys and used the money to buy the books that would go along with my poetry project! I am very thankful for Colby's kind heart!

I am also spending time ordering and purchasing supplies to bring from friends and family members who wanted to support the schools in Kenya. I am very grateful for their interest and generosity! It is getting very busy, but it is a fun busy! I have to have everything put together and packed by Sunday. We are leaving next Thursday. 

Poetry for Kenya

My class has been busy writing poems based on some classic poetry by famous poets. They have created posters of their work for me to bring to Kenya and to use as models and inspiration for the Kenyan students I will be teaching. Students on both sides of the world will be writing about their personalities, the activities they like to do, local wild animals, and the mysterious importance of simple things. Here are some of the creations my students made.



Thank-you to all my students for their hard work. I know the Kenyan students will not only enjoy your poems and pictures, but they will like looking at the photographs of American students their age!

The children and schools of the Mathare Valley

Here are two videos from my trip to the Mathare Valley in Nairobi that I made in 2011. One tells a little about the Mathare Valley slum and the other shows the schools that I will be working in this July. I have shown both of these to the 2nd through 5th graders at New Searles Elementary School this spring to help the children understand where I am going this summer. The students had lots of great questions and discussions.





Actually, this is the "extended version" with some singing at the end!

Let's Travel to Kenya

Mr. Hansen will be traveling to Kenya this summer to work in the schools of the Mathare Valley of Nairobi, Kenya. It is an urban slum with hundreds of thousands of people living in extreme poverty in the middle of the modern city of Nairobi. If you would like to take a trip to the schools of the Mathare Valley, then stay tuned to this blog. To get an up close look, we will have to take a bus from the hotel through the city of Nairobi to get to the Area 2 School where he will be working. Here is a shortened version of the always interesting early morning bus ride that Mr. Hansen recorded when he went to Kenya in 2011.



Here is Mr. Hansen's blog from his trip to Kenya in 2011.