Four weeks of classes into the semester. We have been BUSY. Our director/webkeeper was called away at the end of 2022 due to a death in her family so we apologize for not updating the website as is our custom. In the end, the deceased is believed to be eternally content in Jesus’ presence while those still remaining on the planet are working through steps to keep moving ahead.
Natalia knows none of this of course. She had her 6th birthday while we were on Winter Holidays and we celebrated with her when she returned to classes. From these photos, you can see Delilah (the dog) continues to tolerate hugs and Betsy continues to “teach”.
Our fleet of volunteers has kicked up their gears and bring us monthly lunches as well as come once a week to teach a variety of skills with the boys. Every young person should have the ability to make fried chicken, boil pasta and chop veggies. Who knows what the next lessons will be!? Natalia’s volunteer driver is Lucy – she joined us for birthday cake and games that day.
We are always excited to have Jerry and Christina from WyldLife YounLife join us! We are possibly the smallest group they ever have as far as numbers but we are always enthusiastic! SO THANKFUL to God to their willingness and the willing hands of our staff interpreter Amber.
Thank you each for your prayers as we continue to minister here at CSCD. Pray with us for these students and for those who will be coming in the next and future school years.
So many years, people have commented -IT’S NOT REALLY CHRISTMAS UNTIL I HEAR THE BELLS. We are well into our Christmas music practices and looking forward to presenting our bell choir offerings beginning December 2! To me (Betsy) Christmas has already begun!
If you have opportunity, go to see this movie – I HEARD THE BELLS ON CHRISTMAS DAY – it sounds like an awesome movie about a favorite carol of mine.
During the month of November, we have been writing our THANKFULNESS on leaves and hanging them in the school chapel. The challenge was to NOT REPEAT but to write something new everyday. Today, Monday November 22, the leaves are being removed by a work team from Arrowhead Bible Camp and replaced with Christmas lights and decorations because SCHOOL IS CLOSED for the week of American Thanksgiving and we have a work team to do this job for us.
We celebrated THANKSGIVING on Thursday November 18 when friends from the Palmas Community Church brought us turkey and the WORKS! We are still respecting Covid19 restrictions but allowed those who felt comfortable to sit together indoors. Some of our Deaf ladies have found the stash of perler beads and are enjoying making crafts with them – they took time to eat but then returned to the craft table in a classroom.
Our workteam visitors are WORKING – and we are THANKFUL for the sound of pressure washers and trimmers and mowers and the scent of paint on the gate and the laughter coming from the ladies. Jack, the team leader, is working solo and so far, not laughing.
I pray that YOUR weeks are always filled with giving thanks and that as you take time this week (for our USA friends) to Give Thanks with your families, you will remember to THANK GOD for everything – because even pandemics, natural disasters and unplanned events can be used by God to bring about blessings above and beyond all that we could dream of.
Our 2021 year began with offering a community ASL class. We are excited to have several families and mothers attending the class and look forward to God working through this to reach more with His love. Mizael appears above – as our model for the activities we are planning for the class. You can play the game here! (only through Feb 192021)
We have left our First Friday evening activity time in 2020 and moved to a Second Saturday activity for our Deaf Adult Fellowship. As our population ages, we have to accommodate. Night vision problems were inhibiting some attendees. So now, on the Second Saturday of each month at 1 p.m., we hope to gather in small numbers for indoor or outdoor games – horseshoes? frisbee? dominos in the pergola? Come join us for an afternoon of fellowship in safe numbers and a safe setting.
The pictures above are from NOVEMBER. What was happening that month that prevented us from updating you!?
Oh yea! we were preparing for a visiting work team from Arrowhead Bible Camp and then enjoying the team from Arrowhead Bible Camp. WORKERS they were! Our project was to paint and refresh our school chapel which is celebrating its 30th anniversary in 2020. While here the Arrowhead team did it ALL – finished the project, finished other projects, went to 3 different beaches, kayaked the biobay, had and early Thanksgiving dinner with the school kids, made Diego cry, zipped over Toro Verde in Orocovis, attended the Deaf church in Hato Rey, rode horses at Hacienda Carabali and enjoyed a private afternoon as Las Paylas. In a week.
If you cruise the site, you will see BEFORE photos of the chapel. here are the AFTER ones:
On the day the Arrowhead team left, our school principal received a phone call that Pam Eadie Mowbray had died. Pam was our principal from 1986 through 1996. Pam came to PR and began working at the school in January 1971. She culminated her teaching career here with us 2005(?). Betsy, our principal, has been helping Pam’s husband Alan with odds and ends to tasks. If anyone would like to send him a card or message: Alan Mowbray, Condo Playa Azul1, Apt 1304, Luquillo PR 00773
And now we are preparing for the end of this semester:
Friday, October 11, we were blessed to have only ONE student in attendance. That student took an interest in this millipede so millipedes became the focus of the day. Today is October 18 and we are blessed to have only TWO students in attendance. They were given the opportunity for FIX YOUR FOOD FRIDAY and learned (or helped) to make chili for today’s lunch.
Sometimes, having a small number of students is a blessing. We are able to spend time to chat about THEIR specific lives and needs and trials and joys. Often we have too many children and not enough hands to put into their learning. More and more students coming to us, as a special school, have multiple needs in addition to being Deaf. What a joy when we have one on one time and can share in their lives specifically, learn more about them and pray with them alone.
Pray with us for the special needs of the Deaf in Puerto Rico.
We are excited to have our regular Friday handbell rehearsals and the dedication of the adult Deaf persons who are participating in that. They have their work and their families and yet have this desire for music. One of them told me, “I work and I am stressed all week but I have THIS BELL TIME in my mind and look forward to this time all week.”
Praise God that through the ministry of handbells, this person’s emotional needs are being cared for.
Check out the link above to read more about THAT topic.
Look who is hanging out at the school these days:
Gizmo the iguana!
Natalia – her broken arm has healed 100% without any apparent defect!
Zuleika who is learning and helping and growing in God’s amazing grace,
Diego who has an amazing smile and super-intelligent mind,
Mizael who is still having headaches (which are lessening in intensity) and he is pushing through them to have more time in school.
These are the regulars. We have 4 students – one full-time teacher and two full-time volunteers. Both of the volunteers help in the classroom as well as cooking and doing maintenance respectively. As school principal, Betsy is so thankful for the faithful helpers who work alongside her to allow the school to have continuity and dependability. Our students are all special needs and could be taught one on one all day if we had the resources. Without the resources, we do a lot of One Room Schoolhouse work. The benefits are so cool as the older ones see how the younger ones think and the younger ones are challenged by the older students’ thinking.
Continue to pray for the school, for the students, the workers, the weather… a storm is in the area this week and we are hopeful that we will not have any lasting effects from it. Keep an eye on the weather and remember to pray for us.
Mizael has been diagnosed with a vestibular disorder that is associated with his deafness. Mizael has missed a great portion of the school year due to dizziness, nausea, medical appointments, motion sickness, and headaches.
With all of the analyses, the doctor suggests doing a cochlear implant so that his health will improve and his dizziness will lessen. Some of the medical costs and costs of therapy and recovery will not be covered by the insurance and we are praying for your cooperation to help us with this.
Needed: one (or more) 7(ish) year old hearing-impaired or Deaf children to accompany Diego on his educational journey.
His teacher is older than his grandmother and she needs some help in the PLAY department… The other students are older too and don’t exactly want to swing and play baseball during recess time. Pray with us for the next group of little ones to join in the learning fun.
Needed: one (or more) 2ish something hearing-impaired or Deaf children to accompany Natalie on her educational journey.
It’s just more fun to learn with a friend and have someone to talk with other than the older people around you.
We truly know that language is best learned in community. We have established an environment that is linguistically rich and visually accessible for our students. Pray with us for the little ones in the area – we hear of some in public schools where they are not linguistically stimulated, where they are developing delays in their linguistic development due to the non-accessibility of a visual stimulus accompanying their language experience. Deaf children learn by SEEing and DOing. Hearing children learn by hearing. English and Spanish are but auditory languages. They do not reach into the brains of a child who has a hearing loss of any significant levels.
And hearing aids don’t FIX things the same way glasses can fix things. My students all have hearing losses into the orange region of the audiogram at this LINK. They do not hear most of the speech sounds without extra help – that means raising my voice, using a hearing aid or other amplification. Most parents don’t take the time to look their hard-of-hearing/Deaf child in the face to have a conversation. So the child misses out on 82.9% (totally off the cuff estimation) of what is said. They are left wondering, guessing, trying to fill in the blanks.
On the other hand, most parents don’t raise a HAND to help their hearing-impaired child:
About 90%of the deaf population has two hearing parents and 88% of those parents do not know sign language. LINK HERE
And so I know there are children experiencing LANGUAGE DEPRIVATION simply because someone told their parents that having an interpreter is the answer. Suppose you don’t know ASL (American Sign Language) and you travel to China and you are given an ASL-Chinese interpreter. How much are you going to learn about China from watching the ASL interpreter?
Exactly what a child who doesn’t KNOW ASL faces when watching someone batting their hands around in first grade. The child MUST be in a place to learn the language so that they can then access the materials of learning. How does one learn a language? Come on, you know. You learned a language. You are reading this. YES! You learned by listening to your world from the time your ears developed (about week 16 of gestation inside your mom) you were learning the language of your world. But a child born deaf missed out on even that opportunity. Of course, some babies are born hearing and then lose the sense through trauma… but alas, without a language, they are left behind.
And so, would you pray for those children who are in this area, on this island? Because we have some lovely little ones here beginning to learn ASL and speaking and communicating in glorious ways… and my heart breaks every time I meet a small child who is SO isolated because the significant forces at work for the child haven’t grasped the idea that LANGUAGE development is IMPERATIVE to life experience and learning.
Look who is hanging out at the school these days:
Needed: one (or more) 2ish something hearing-impaired or Deaf children to accompany Natalie on her educational journey.
