Anne Stein

Today was a long, productive, and learning-filled day. We went in early to meet Angelina. It had been over two weeks, so I was really excited to see her and talk to her. It was good--she and Max are really impressed with what we've done. We also discussed some of the issues with our family: the food disconnect and the grandson's discipline, more specifically. She explained some of the cultural food differences to us, and had a few suggestions. For one, we should ask them what they like. We should also keep ingredients for the food they like in our own refrigerator, in case a cooking emergency arises. Things like that. She also told us an easy recipe for chicken the Botswana way. The key will be communication, and probably a schedule and maybe a menu. It's intimidating to communicate, but I should get over that. I also think the balance is a bit in favor of us accommodating them, rather than the flip side of the coin, but it is what it is.

Afterwards, we trekked to the Anne Stein Center (?), a school for disabled children. For an hour, we sat with, played, and read to about 12-15 mentally (and some also physically) disabled children, around ages 4 to 12. It was quite a challenge! They have several staff, but the children are still hard to control. Since their verbal skills are lacking, they often "communicate" with hitting, and there is a lot of stealing with toys and tears. They have a good system of rotating everyone through the bathroom, which was impressive. In several ways, though, they have a way to go. They are a bit rougher with the children than we would be in the US, and many levels of disability and different kinds are mixed together in one room. But it was good that they have a place to go, and people who care about them, and that they live with their parents still instead of being shuffled to institutions.

After that adventure, we were drained and did a little work on the curriculum, but mostly reflected on the adventure. And we started distributing user surveys. Already the trend is that users want computer training and internet access, overwhelmingly.