Teacher: Lavinia Onişoru

The Homework Club was started when it became apparent that all the hard work that had been started at the kindergarten was being lost when the children went to school. Suddenly they were left without support, had little encouragement from often illiterate parents and homes that are dark, crowded, noisy and not conducive for doing their homework.

One wise man once said that the society of which its people have educational deficiency, is a society with out hope for a good future, a society in which the rules with the role of self development and collective evolution are not allowed to be implemented. I believe that the education these children are receiving during their first years of life it is very important. For most of the children within the Homework Club, the social and moral education lacks within the whole family. Not all parents can be good examples for their children, so it is important for them to know people and behavior that can be followed.

Latest Update – August 2024

This school year has been a successful one for all the children attending the Homework Club. With God’s help, who blessed the children’s hard work and sustained effort and gave them the strength to concentrate and pay attention, all the children have passed the class, some with good results and some with very good results. As usual, I tried to encourage the children’s development on all levels: psychosocial, emotional, relational and academic and to maintain a positive atmosphere and a welcoming environment, creating a place where the children always feel welcome. The children love coming to the Homework Club as it is an oasis of peace, tranquility and joy for them, where they can escape for a few hours from the sad world they often experience outside. The help they receive with homework, the presence of the other children, the laughter, the coloured pencils, the candies and chocolate, the games, all these brighten their faces and their lives and help them see a little light for their future.

Concerning   the psychosocial   aspects, the children continued to learn how to better understand and manage their emotions, how to relate positively with the other children and received encouragement in order to develop their self-esteem and self-confidence. They often have a very low opinion of themselves, are afraid of giving wrong answers, of embarrassing themselves and lack the courage to try. During this term, the relationships between the children have strengthened and improved considerably. The composition of the group has not changed, but Teodora Tiugă has integrated much better into the group, managing to establish more or less close relationships with all the children. Her relationship with Măriuca Gangal continued to improve, the two became close friends and had very few conflicts lately. Măriuca also managed to overcome her jealousy towards the other children and caused much less conflicts than before.

In the school aspects, almost all the children have progressed during this term, managing to overcome a lack of motivation and to work with more diligence and enthusiasm, which increased their work rhythm, developed their knowledge and brought them good and very good results. During this term, the following children stood out: Măriuca Gangal, Tania Gangal, Paula Pipirig, Manole Bianca and Matei Tiugă. Măriuca has put more effort into her homework, which makes me very happy and makes me hope that she will follow in the footsteps of her sister, Tania, who has very good school results and shows great enthusiasm for school activities. Matei Tiugă’s academic skills are well above his class level, and he is already able to read on his own and to work independently most of the time. Bianca Manole has managed to come to the Homework Club on time now, as she has finished school and is starting to get back into a work rhythm, but with small steps and a lot of insistence from me.

In terms of creativity, the children continued to develop their artistic and practical skills, managing to create original, neat, brightly colored and eye catching works. In this area, Matthew Tiuga stood out in particular, as he considerably improved his practical cutting and gluing skills, as well as his artistic skills, managing to colour more beautifully and neatly, and respecting the contours of the pictures more. The children’s drawings bursted with creativity, exuberance, joy, life and colour, introducing the viewer for a few moments into the wonderful and colourful world of children. As usual, in the summer months, one of the main attractions was painting on stones. The children carefully collected stones of different shapes and sizes, washed them, then painted them with different patterns and colors, letting their imagination run free or getting inspired, and managed to create an impressive collection of stones, which they took home or displayed outside our courtyard.

During this term, in our lessons, we discussed the following topics: reverence, honesty, self-discipline, love, gratitude, justice, hospitality, joy.  In the lesson on justice, the children were very excited to solve difficult riddles and mysteries from some videos I showed them. They had to pay close attention to details and play the role of the judge, having to guess which character is guilty of a certain action. Some of the children amazed me with their highly developed abilities of observation and their advanced logical thinking skills. In the lesson on love, we discussed the five love languages of children (words of affirmation, physical touch, quality time, gifts, acts of service) and tried to find out together which of these languages characterizes each child. I emphasized that true love always involves more than words, it makes sacrifices and deeds that prove the truth of words. This is how God loved us, He did not stay indifferent in heaven, but in His love for us, He acted, leaving heaven and taking the form of a man, then sacrificing His life for our salvation. I tried to reinforce this with a short movie that we watched together, called John 3:16 – The Story of Love, about a father who had to choose between saving the lives of some strangers on a train and saving the life of his child. This father symbolizes God, who chose to sacrifice His only begotten Son to save the lives of us sinful people. In the lessons I included, as usual, video stories, games, riddles, sometimes songs, and in the Bible lessons, the children continued to learn a Bible verse for each topic.

Unfortunately, at the end of this school year, we are saying goodbye to David Marcu, who will be moving to the 5th grade and will start studying in the afternoon, thus not being able to attend the Homework Club anymore. We are grateful for the beautiful time we spent together and for the memories we made and wish him success! From the fall, we are looking forward to welcoming new children to join the group and form our dear Homework Club again!

During this term I have observed that the role of the parent is important for a child.  The children are very affected and then get confused when they are told and shown how they behave at home and that they are copying other wrong behavior. Because of this, I have considered that a character lesson should be taught throughout the week.  This way they will be able to present a different character from their family, to analyze them together in order to see if they are good, and understand the proper way to behave.

Throughout this period of time, the children have gained knowledge, new abilities and they have developed their character. They understood the importance of the rules and the way we must behave in our society. The children from the Homework Club have a really good ability to understand the presented concepts. As they are older it was easier for them to be focused for a longer time during the lessons.

For this term I wanted to focus more on developing the right behavior in the family and society. In order for this to happen, I realized lessons to develop the civic abilities should be taught, such as: Empathy, Goodness and Evil, Trust, Seriousness, Politeness, Respect and Courage. In order for the students to understand the meaning and importance of these lessons, I have been presenting them together with different kind of illustrated stories.  The kids are “attracted” by the illustrated stories and most of them are able to remember the stories really well. Besides the stories, I have added also songs and small poems for them to learn and remember. The biblical lessons have been connected by the importance of a pure and clean life given to our Lord Jesus Christ. The children have been more receptive and attentive to the presented illustrations about the life of Jesus.