As you may remember, we mentioned that one of the purposes
of this trip was to help Scripture Union Tanzania train some of their staff/full-time
volunteers so that they would then be able to conduct trainings for Christians
who want to teach the newly published Swahili Biblical values curriculum in
school classrooms, churches, and/or communities. In response to that statement,
one of our supporters asked us to describe how we plan to go about doing such a
training of trainers. Our response was simple...not sure how that was going to happen but was requested by our Ugandan colleague, Beth. During our second week in Uganda (please see photos in the previous blog regarding the first week),
the three of us (Beth, Laura and Ruth), spent several days discussing logistics
and strategies mixed with a lot of prayer. Although a huge dose of flexibility
was demanded after those plans, the process began to come together
as only God could do it.
Upon our arrival Jan.18 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, we met
Stellah, the Scripture Union Tanzania National Director and, with joy, saw and held the first copies of the Swahili Forgiveness and Purity
Modules in our hands! Stellah asked us to pour our efforts during the next four
days into five of her key staff/volunteers whom she felt were capable of
training others to teach this newly translated and published curriculum. All of
them had taught at least a couple of lessons of the English curriculum
in a school. During the first two days, we traveled about 1 ½ hours
one way (some of the way over washed out roads!) to a
Primary School and observed the SU Team teaching the brand new Swahili curriculum on
Forgiveness in three classrooms simultaneously. Although we do not understand Swahili, we had the English Teachers Manual in our hands and followed as best we could. (Language was no barrier when it came to comprehending
how much the students and their teachers were enjoying the Swahili lessons.) Following their classes, we met together for lunch and discussed our
observations, giving affirmation and suggestions. Together they worked on
learning the songs in Swahili and deciding on appropriate actions. The last two
days were spent at the Scripture Union office watching them demonstrate the
rest of the lessons in front of each other and giving mutual encouragement and
suggestions. Stellah then selected four of them to become the Training Team for
the first ever Swahili VOICE Training to be held on the island of Zanzibar the
next week.
All of us traveled to Zanzibar via ferry and the 3-day training,
focused on Forgiveness, began on Tuesday, Jan. 28…in straight Swahili! The
Training Team bonded quickly with the 22 participants and learned the songs,
actions, definitions, etc. effortlessly. Beth marveled at the speed and
delight—there was no comparison with trainings she had done in the past with
her English being translated into Swahili! On the third day, the participants
then demonstrated some of the lessons with the Swahili Training Team leading
the evaluation. The three of us merely observed and coached a bit from the
sidelines. As we stood in a circle holding hands during the closing, all
praised God for the training and the newly printed Swahili curriculum, and
entered into fervent prayer that God would use the newly trained teachers to
make an eternal difference as they determined to teach the curriculum to children
and youth of that island. Of course, there were challenges and obstacles to
overcome, but by God’s grace all went ahead and God’s name was lifted up. For Laura,
unexpected news came on the morning of the first day of training that her 97
year-old Aunt had slipped into eternity. The day following the training, Beth
and Ruth joined Laura in taking time to stop, reflect on, and remember Aunt
Doris as Laura’s family members gathered in Canada for the funeral.
A couple of days later, Tuesday, Feb. 4, the same training was
repeated in Arusha, Tanzania, for about 46 participants. One of the original four
was unable to join us, but the remaining three did a great job. Upon our return to Dar es Salaam, we gave a glowing report to Stellah as we encouraged her to engage them in other training
opportunities as soon as possible so as to not lose momentum.
As we write this, we are in Nairobi, Kenya, for several
purposes, one of which is to sort out the printing bill for the Swahili VOICE
curriculum…which is proving to be quite a challenge, but our trust is in God; prayer is appreciated.
Praise God for His plans, His amazing work of bringing this
tool in Swahili to Tanzania, and how He put together the initial Swahili
Training Team!
