{"id":40115,"date":"2023-02-17T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-02-16T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/steps.eliasarndt.de\/viel-erlebt-und-dazu-gelernt\/"},"modified":"2023-02-17T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2023-02-16T22:00:00","slug":"been-through-a-lot-and-learned-from-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/viel-erlebt-und-dazu-gelernt\/","title":{"rendered":"Experienced and learnt a lot"},"content":{"rendered":"

Experienced and learnt a lot<\/h2>\n

Sophie has already seen, experienced and learned a lot in the short time she has been at steps in\u00a0Okakarara\u00a0<\/a>which is what this post is about. In it, she describes her steps day-to-day life and what it is like to come to Namibia and stay there for just a few months.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hello from Okakarara!<\/h2>\n

My name is Sophie, I am 19 years old and since 12\/01\/23, so for just over a month now, I have been at the\u00a0steps for children project in Okakarara.<\/a>\u00a0I am a short-term volunteer for around three months. At the end of April, Lucie, my fellow volunteer, and I will be heading back to Germany.<\/p>\n

It is strange when I think that I have only been living here for four weeks. Because in this short time, I have already seen, experienced and learned a lot. I owe that not least to our fellow volunteer Pauline, who has already been living here since August and is staying for a whole year. She welcomed Lucie and me warmly and gave us a great start.
As a result, I have settled in very well in Okakarara and quickly got used to life here and the surroundings. The only thing I still find challenging from time to time is the temperature, because it cannot be compared with the weather in Germany.<\/p>\n

The morning<\/h2>\n

By now, I also have a routine in my working days. In general, the weekdays can always be divided into a morning and an afternoon. For us, the morning is always roughly from 8 to 12 o'clock. That means I get up around 7 o'clock in the morning, get ready for the day and have breakfast. Just before 8 o'clock, the three of us walk together to the steps grounds, which are only a good 100 metres from where we are staying. The first hour in the morning, I then visit a class (PreSchool, Kindergarten or ECD (Early Childhood Developement)) in their morning circle. After that, the children have breakfast.<\/p>\n

From about 10 to 11 o'clock, art and Mousebook are on the agenda. On Mondays and Wednesdays, I go to a PreSchool class and help the teacher with Mousebook. In Mousebook, the children learn things like colours, up and down, or right and left through various tasks, exercises and games.<\/p>\n

On all other days, I help Lucie at this time with art activities for the children. At the beginning of each week, we always think of something creative that we can paint or make with the children.<\/p>\n

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The result is of course secondary; what is usually much nicer is to observe how much fun the children have with the tasks or how focused they work in between.<\/b><\/em><\/p>\n

The last hour of the morning often varies a lot. Either I play a little outside in the yard with the children, or we are given other extra tasks during the day that can be done well at this time.<\/p>\n

Just before 12 o'clock, all the children have lunch in the soup kitchen. On some days, we like to sit down with them and eat with them too.<\/p>\n

Lunch break<\/h2>\n

From 12 to 14 o'clock, we then have lunch break. It is always nice to recover a little from the morning and recharge our batteries.<\/p>\n

The afternoon<\/h2>\n

Around 14 o'clock, the afternoon lessons begin, the ASC (After School Care) for us with the fifth to seventh formers. In general, everyone there is supposed to start first with the homework they have received from school. If they have questions or do not understand it, we help them and provide them with learning materials such as books or exercise books that they need for this. For the children who either have no homework for the day at all or finish it quickly, we have our own worksheets to deepen their English or maths skills.<\/p>\n

When everyone has finished the day\u2019s tasks and there is still time left, they can also play together. At the end of an afternoon, we always have a \u201eCookie Time\u201c. This means that all the children line up one after the other in a queue with us and have to solve a maths problem (usually from the times tables). For a correct answer, they get a cookie.<\/p>\n

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That means that for us, a successful working day comes to an end and we have the rest of the evening free. We also have the weekends free from Friday at 12 noon, so we can do our shopping, go to church on Sundays or go on an outing.<\/p>\n

For me, it is so lovely every morning to see the children and notice how happy they are to see us. As soon as I go into a class, for example, all the children wave excitedly from their seats. Often I walk across the yard and a child suddenly comes running out of nowhere and hugs me. Usually it doesn\u2019t take long before you are surrounded by lots of children. But what I really love most is that here you learn to appreciate the smallest things, day by day.<\/p>\n

A warm welcome at steps <\/h2>\n

I am very surprised at how quickly one settles into this new culture. You automatically try to adapt, and I love it when I learn new things from the local people. The staff at this facility welcomed us warmly and make it much easier for me to settle in here.\u00a0
You are still gaining new experiences every day, but you learn to cope with everything and gradually understand more and more how things work here. So far, I feel very comfortable and settled in Okakarara.<\/p>\n

The language barrier \u2013 is surmountable<\/h2>\n

In advance, I did not necessarily expect there to be a greater language barrier in some cases, which makes communication with some staff members, but of course especially with the younger children, more difficult. The little ones only learn some English words over time, which is why it is sometimes difficult for us to convey a work instruction when no teacher is present to translate. On the other hand, I think it is great, because it means I am also learning a few words of Otjiherero to communicate basic things, such as \u201eii\u201c = \u201eyes\u201c, \u201ekako\u201c = \u201eno\u201c, Otjiti! = \u201eStop that!\u201c, \u201eHaama!\u201c = \u201eSit down!\u201c, \u201eIndjo\u201c = \u201eCome!\u201c, Tuka = \u201eJump!\u201c or \u201eTupuka!\u201c = \u201eRun!\u201c.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Warm greetings from Okakarara to Germany!<\/p>\n

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Dear Sophie, we wish you a wonderful, experience-filled time at steps for children in Okakarara. We sincerely thank you for your commitment on the ground; it is very valuable for the children and young people!<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Viel erlebt und dazu gelernt Sophie hat in der kurzen Zeit, in der sie bei steps in\u00a0Okakarara\u00a0ist, schon viel gesehen, erlebt und dazu gelernt. In diesem Beitrag beschreibt sie ihren steps Alltag und wie es ist, nach Namibia zu kommen und f\u00fcr nur wenige Monate dort zu bleiben.\u00a0 Hallo aus Okakarara! Ich bin Sophie, 19 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,30,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-informieren","category-steps-aktuell","category-steps-in-okakarara"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40115\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stepsforchildren.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}