Week Four's Slum Experience!

Sunday marked the beginning of Week 04! We have another great group here this week. Wow. The summer is almost halfway over...but we still have plenty of groups coming!

Week Four students participated in the Slum Experience Sunday. While in the slums, they realized how difficult it can be to meet basic needs, such as food and shelter.

Some students had to ask around for a long time to find jobs:

And we learned that sometimes, these jobs take a long time and give us little money:

Building on previous workers

Yesterday, Week Three students worked in the Global Village as we do every Wednesday. The first week of L&S, we began work on two new gardens in South America. Each week, a little more work is being done, and the staff is enjoying seeing the progress of each project as it continues.

This week, the Bolivia team created a terrace going down the hill. They had to find rocks to build the retaining wall and break up the soil to prepare it for planting. The garden that Week One began and Week Two planted has small plants popping out of the soil! Here's one of our youth smoothing out the terrace:

Another garden near Guatemala is almost finished! It has beautiful, rock-lined paths, raised beds and a wire fence. This week's group got to plant some of the garden and also planted fig trees outside. In the weeks to come, a fence will need to be built and the garden tended. Here's a glimpse of the garden:

Creating these gardens is similar to the mission teams that SIFAT sends to Bolivia and Ecuador. Each team builds on what the last team did. While the team is in a country, its people work with the US team to help the citizens. In the same way, in between Learn & Serve students, the SIFAT staff (mainly John and Andy and volunteers Robert and Megan) work on the gardens, which benefit SIFAT. SIFAT supports short-term teams for long-term development.

But...we can't forget the other groups that didn't work on these two gardens! The Ecuador team worked in our main garden by the community house, and they were able to spend some time by the pond after finishing. Ecuador also worked on making some crafts from bamboo in their micro enterprise.

Here are a few more photos:

Week Three, Day Two...

Myrtle Grove is here for Week Three. Although we have a small group this week, there's still excitement on campus. Last night, I wasn't able to attend worship, but as I walked into the Guest House, I could hear their singing coming across the campus!

Today, the students will be equipped with appropriate technologies that are part of everyday life for the majority of the world. They'll be cooking on sawdust stoves and finding nutritious plants that are used in Leaf for Life.

We'll try to post some photos of this group soon. Thanks for reading about L&S and praying for these students!

Week Two: Experiences in the Village

Week Two is going great! They're preparing to leave campus to go serve our local Hispanic community and also help in a reading tutor program.

Yesterday, students worked hard in the village as part of their Third World experience. Four "countries" completed several work projects and were able to go to market, sell their wares or receive payment for their labor, and receive enough money to purchase food for their dinner.

The Philippine house was loved! The Philippine team cleaned underneath their house, built a new firewood rack and weeded the garden area.

The Bolivia team planted corn in the garden prepared by Week One! They also started work on terraces that future teams will complete.

Uganda made bricks that will be used on future projects and also started a micro enterprise by making furniture out of bamboo.

Nepal worked on a new garden by Guatemala. They hauled rocks, broke up the soil and started constructing beds.

After a day of gathering water, tending fires, working on micro enterprises and laboring on their lands, everyone enjoyed a worship time when we got to hear Isabel, a SIFAT Practicum graduate, talk about her life in Guatemala.

Between eating and worship, beautiful music filled the Village...the Philippines family found a use for the old bamboo they found!

More photos from Week One

From a request by Leslie from Brookhaven...

Here are more pictures from the local Hispanic community that some of the Week One students served.

Does anyone have photos from the art camp project? If so, please email me (Marie) some of your best shots, and I'll post those, too!

Week One Review

Here's a short (10 photo) slide show from last week.

Week Two is in full swing! Come back later for some photos of this week's adventures!

L&S Week One is over :(...but L&S Week Two starts soon!

Week One is finished, but everyone who attended realizes that it's actually just a new beginning for their youth groups! They have been given a challenge to be "here. now." in their communities and the world.

For our Week One students (and adults!), we want to hear from you about your experience. Please post some comments to let us know what you think and to share with the students who will be coming in future weeks!

Here are some questions to get you started, but feel free to comment about other stuff, too!
1. What was your favorite part of L&S? Why?
2. How did L&S change you?
3. Has your youth group talked about starting any kind of ministries in your community? If so, what are you planning and how will it happen?
4. What was your favorite free time activity?
5. Spear groups...worship...cafeteria...devotions...community missions...global village...slums

Watch for a post (soon) to find out more about our fun counselors! Warning: it may be more than you want to know...

Serving our Community

This morning, Week One's youth groups went off to serve the local communities near SIFAT. Some groups are hosting a day camp in a Hispanic neighborhood, while other groups are helping with a local children's art camp.

This week, we've been gotten a chance to look at our lives, the lives of people living in developing countries and how we can do something with this new view.

Here's a few pictures from Tuesday, when we were equipped with appropriate technologies and micro enterprises.

You can see we learned to make candles using hot dyed bees' wax and cold water. We also got the chance to cook on sawdust stoves!

Week One is here!!!

Wow! It is already Tuesday in Week One. We are having so much fun at Learn & Serve this week. The counselors were in training all last week, and they worked hard, played hard and were ready for the summer to start.

Yesterday, L&Sers got the opportunity to be exposed to several different Third World countries while visiting the Global Village.

In South America, they made tortillas...

After getting the chance to mash hominy, the L&Sers were able to use a press and cook their tortillas!

In Africa, they learned how to make bricks...

First, you have to sift dirt. After water and straw are added, the mud is pounded into a form!

In Asia, they practiced a way of dancing -- tinikling ...

Long bamboo poles are used keep the rhythm of the dance , while those dancing move in and out between the poles!