Well, so far we have had two tutoring sessions at Traditions Apartments. We had 11 kids and 9 tutors show up last week and 13 kids and 9 tutors this week, which means we almost have a one to one ratio. The first week we mainly played games just to get to know the kids. This week we had a handful of kids show up with homework, but the majority didn’t have any. For the kids that didn’t have any, we spent time working on their math skills. We grouped the kids together by their school grades and then played War. To win a hand, the kids would have to do a math problem. The younger kids worked on their addition and subtraction while the older kids worked on multiplication and division. One of the third grade boys had so much fun that he said he was going come next week at 5:59 (We start at 6 PM). That’s good because half the kids seem to arrive 30 minutes into tutoring. I have a trick up my sleeve for the weeks to come to get the kids there on time.

I’m really excited about what God is doing there at Traditions through tutoring. I like the challenge of starting something new. I mentioned to the tutors this week how awesome it is to be a part of these kids’ lives. For some of the kids, schoolwork can be extremely stressful. I remember being in first grade. My mom worked late trying to put food on the table, so she didn’t have a lot of time to help me with my homework. To make matters worse, unfortunately, at the time, my mom wasn’t serving God. She had a boyfriend living in the house who wasn’t a good fatherly figure. He was abusive. He hated God and everything to do with God. We kids were extremely afraid of him. Some of the dumbest things would make him furious. I remember getting physically punished just because I dropped a newspaper. To avoid being punished, I would take home schoolwork that I got good grades on. All the work that I got D’s or F’s on I would leave in my desk at school. One day my first grade teacher noticed all the trash spilling out of my desk. She made me clean out my desk and take them home. I dreaded going home that day. I remember watching the clock. My stomach turning in knots as it got closer to 3 o’clock. My brother always got home from school much later than me. That day my brother got home from school before me, because I walked as slow as I possibly could. During my long journey home, I threw some of the papers away in the trash can at the park. I would then walk a few feet and drop a few papers. I continued to drop a few papers here and there as I walked. I felt like I was doing wrong, but I didn’t want to get in trouble. (If I would have thought about it, I would have thrown all the papers away.) I finally got home with about half the papers that I started with. I don’t remember how I was punished. All I remember is that it wasn’t good. For me, schoolwork was extremely frustrating. I had no one to help me with my homework. I tried hard to get things right, but seemed to fail the more I tried. I just needed help. The kids that we are working with may not be going through the same situation that I was, but there are kids who are in turmoil over schoolwork. With tutoring we are able to offer help to these kids and at the same time introduce them to the Prince of Peace.