Category: teaching
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Saying Goodbye
The rain came, and it seemed nonstop for an entire month. Streets flooded, water rushed under bridges, and still the rain fell. July 2018 brought floods to areas of the Sichuan province, drenching my final days in China. With mixed emotions, I looked out the window of my 15th floor apartment and sighed. From atop […]
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Semester of Storytelling
In the Spring Semester of 2018 at 绵阳师范学院 (Mianyang Teachers’ College), I explored storytelling with my Sophomore classes. I guided them each week through the basics of the hero’s journey, genre, and sequencing toward a final group project. The project was to form a story, write the dialogue, and finally film themselves performing their story. […]
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Summer Project 2017
Panzhihua (攀枝花) is a small town–for China–nestled in a mountainous area of southern Sichuan province. Back in July I spent 2 weeks as part of a group of Peace Corps Volunteers offering training to local Primary and Middle School English teachers. It was a 14-hour train ride south from Chengdu through some lovely countryside. There […]
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When Writing Gets Creative, a Reflection on the Peace Corps Write On! Competition
Aliens. Robots. Environmental destruction. Pollution loving aliens. Secret agents. Witches. Killer friends. Dystopian futures. Birds engulfed in shadow. These are a few topics students at my college wrote about during the creative writing competition last month. I was honored to host Write On!, an international creative writing competition facilitated by Peace Corps Volunteers around the […]
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Postcards From My Students
A few weeks ago I had my sophomore students create a postcard (or use a real one or photo). The assignment started by asking them to think of something that represented themselves. In class they wrote and shared about it, then I asked them to create a postcard for the following week. One-by-one they presented […]
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Photos from the last few months
More updates about the last few months that I experienced in Indonesia. There was a lot packed into March, April, May, and June, so here’s a tiny preview: I helped with some retreats: And then we got to refresh with a nice panorama of Lake Toba: There were some special Sunday worships from the HKBP […]
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Much needed update
A lot has been happening in the months of silence on this blog. For one, I was able to have some time in the States over Christmas and New Years. When I returned to Indonesia in January, I still had paperwork to clear up with immigration, and had to make a quick trip to Jakarta […]
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Examination and Graduation
On August 14, 2013 the school held an oral examination of the graduating students. It was a busy and intense day for everyone, especially the students. They were questioned one-by-one in three areas: society, theology, and health. The Ephorus (Presiding Bishop of the whole denomination) was there, as well as the #2 in the denomination, […]