WILL ALL PLEASE NOTE THAT FADIGA IS BACK IN THE SENEGAL SQUAD!!!!!!!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/foot...

Dear friends,

You will have to forgive me for repeating myself, but time has once again flown since Christmas and I find my time here rapidly drawing to a close. Two terms have now passed and only one remains. This last term has once again been full of energy, busy and hectic schedules, and full of sport. I find myself more tired than I had realised and welcoming a break.


SIPS
Term two is not nicknamed “The Sports Term” for no reason! The whole term is spent gearing up for SIPS (Sports Invitational for Private Schools) which takes place between the 5th and 9th of March. Monday afternoons at BCS brought “Running Club” where kids, staff and parents ran distances of 1500m, 3k, or even 5k. Other afternoons were spent training for either football or volleyball. For those of you who don’t know, I injured my ankle whilst playing football during the first week of term. I sprained it and tore some of the ligaments around it and so was not able to do any sports for around three weeks. My ankle is still not fully healed due to the fact I started doing sport too early, and so recently I have been told to try and not do sport for 5 weeks in an attempt to let it heal completely.
SIPS itself was a really great time. BCS came third out of the 5 competing schools and many of our kids won medals for being the best athletes in their age category. The first day was long distance running where many of our kids did well. The second day brought the group stages of football and volleyball where our teams did not do so well but still gave their all and had a good time which was great to see. The third day was without a doubt the best day for BCS. Track and Field were held in Senegal’s national stadium (where I had the chance to watch Senegal play earlier in the year). Many of our kids came first in the age groups in all the different events. There was even a staff relay race where the team I was running in came first! The fourth day was the finals of football and volleyball and the final group stage matches. Our teams didn’t do too well and so they only got to play the last of their group stage matches. Massive celebrations were seen however when Joshua Meribole scored his team’s only goal in their last match (even though they still lost).
Looking back now, SIPS was such a great opportunity for the kids to be with their parents and make them proud- and they did.


School Life
As I think I mentioned in my last newsletter, my role in school this past term has been different to my previous one. Yes, I am now a full time French teacher and no longer teach ESL. Due to this I feel I have enjoyed this term (school wise) much more than the first term. I struggled to find motivation and ideas for teaching ESL as it wasn’t a subject I was overly enthusiastic about (plus English was my least favourite subject during school). However with French I have found some motivation and enjoyment as I teach something I feel I am good at and know about, to kids who are more responsive to my methods of teaching. I currently teach year 7, one of our more advanced year 10s and share the teaching of our year 11. They all seem to be doing well and learning everything that is required of them, which is a real encouragement. Year 7 is the first year that our students start studying French so in that regard it isn’t too challenging for me, however the other two students that I teach have a very high level of French that I feel in some places is even superior to mine. Bruno (year 10) has been through French school and so my job is not so much teaching him, but just keeping his French fresh and making sure he doesn’t lose it. Christophe(Y11) is doing his A level French (highers in Scotland) and so I have been asked to work on his vocabulary with him.

Dorm Life
Dorm life has been much the same as the first term. One of our boys has returned to the USA for a while and so we only have four boys now, but that hasn’t meant any decrease i

Hello all, and greetings from Senegal!
Well… It’s been four months now and life is great! So many things have happened since I wrote my last newsletter back in Septermber. I can’t believe it’s been so long. Time has passed really quickly yet I feel like I’ve been here longer than four months. Life has been so busy I haven’t had any other chance to write really so these Christmas holidays seem the perfect opportunity.
School Life
After four months as a teacher, I think I’m finally beginning to get the hang of it! The kids seem to be enjoying it and learning some things through it so I must be doing something right… I might be getting another student after the holidays but I’m not absolutely sure of that yet. I have started to teach/supervise a bit of French so it’s nice to have a bit of change from teaching ESL most of the time. We lose Coralie(our French teacher) after the holidays as she goes back to France, so I have been asked to teach Y7 French and have discussions with our one year 11 student.
In other parts of school life, a few weeks ago we had the BCS “Winter” Olympics. This was spread over a weekend and involved all kinds of events ranging from ice hockey (played using a puck made of ice) and bob sleighing to curling and tug of war. It was a really good opportunity for all the kids to get outside and support each other and enjoy themselves. The Sunday afternoon of the weekend was spent on the beach where we had a tug of war and enjoyed a great time in the sea. All the parents of the kids were invited so it was also a really good opportunity for them to see their kids and enjoy a bit of school life.
Dorm Life
Hmm, where to start… Dorm life is great! It’s probably the part of life here that I enjoy the most. At the beginning of term I spent most of my free time in the dorm but began to find it really exhausting. I don’t spend so much of my time there now, but still am around the dorm for most of the time and I really enjoy just spending time with the kids. The floor of our house just recently got tiled so I spent a week sleeping in the dorm with the boys while the work was done. It was a really tiring week but I really enjoyed it as did the boys!
The dorm activity schedule has been absolutely full this term. Every weekend there has been something really exciting for the kids to do. We have had the Gaul’s weekend based on Asterix and Obelix, we have had a backwards day, crazy hair day, and many more. One of the highlights was undoubtedly the Christmas party. We had a fantastic meal followed by a visit from Santa. The size of some of the smiles on the kid’s faces was incredible. Even the staff got to sit on Santa’s lap!
Unfortunately the dorm parents of Eagle (the dorm I am in) have now left. Tobi and Damaris were only here for a couple of months as a way of filling in some spare time during their teacher training. The kids will really miss them as will we. We had a really nice evening before the end of term where we (the kids, Svenja and I) gave them a present and had a really great time around the dinner table. The dorm parents from last year are now due to arrive with their newborn daughter. It will be interesting to see if things will change much in the dorm or not and how the kids will react to having new dorm parents.
Men’s Retreat
At the beginning of December, I had the chance to go to a men’s retreat for all the men serving in Senegal. Entitled GOR (Guys On Retreat) it was a really fantastic weekend. It was situated in St.Louis in the north of the country and on a remote peninsula near the city. The weekend involved some really competitive games and involved all sorts of things, ranging from push ups and swimming, to crossword puzzles and litter pick up. It was a really great time to just spend time with other guys and find out what it is exactly that they are doing in Senegal and just to have a bit of a time where we could do some really guy type thin