Getting Established

Morning peeps! It’s the weekend! Yay!
Today I got up at the wonderful time of Quite-Late. So I shall spend what’s left of the morning telling you wonderful people what the average week at XLP is like (so far):
On Mondays all us eXperience students spend a day at the office in training. We have covered all sorts of interesting topics like community, what the point of youthwork is, modern values and Christian values, youthwork do’s and don’ts, and addressing fear. It’s a really nice time to catch up with all the other teams and find out what they’ve been up to in the week, and to plan going out. We have a regular group going up to Hillsong on Sunday evenings, I think I’ll go along tomorrow~
Tuesdays we start the day with a prayer time, and then walk to Northbrook school to do a lunch club. We are due to do some reading support there according to my timetable, but we haven’t started that yet. After school from 3pm we do an after school club called Live Lounge, which is held in the community wing of Emmanuel Pentecostal Church, and they have a PS2 and a pool table, table tennis, lots of comfy chairs and a tuck shop. It’s a nice place just to chill with the kids that come along and get to know them more. There was a really positive atmosphere and the kids really enjoyed it. At about half 4 we have a meal which we take in turns to cook, and we all get to sit round the table and have a discussion. This week it was about whether video games and music affect out behaviour. It’s really interesting to hear their views on things.
I am learning as much from the kids as I am teaching them. A girl at Northbrook was telling me yesterday about how she sees the eXperience students start the year all quiet then they grow in confidence. It reminds me that age is no barrier to wisdom, and that you can’t have high opinions of yourself!
On Wednesdays we start earlier (at ten :O We don’t have early starts at XLP which I am glad :D), and do some in class support in Addey and Stanhope school which is a bit more challenging. We have to sit in lessons with a specific pupil and help them with their school work. I have one lovely student and one challenging student, so it will be a case of sticking at it. Please pray for perseverance. After we do classroom support we do a lunch club there which was packed out and really good fun.
We then have time at the office for lunch and for a team meeting – this term we use this time to plan our video project – we have to make a 3 minute film for TrueTube (like youtube but with a social action / theological focus) on the topic of our boroughs, which we will be filming in the second half of half term.
After that me and Ruth zip off to The Barn, the 15-17 youth group at our church, and help out there. At the moment the church youth groups are the highlight of my week  I get back quite late from that and get to see the shining lights of the big city from the railway line on the way back from the bus stop. Here is a piccy:
Thursdays me and Ruth spend the day at the office doing church stuff – we have prayer sessions and mentoring in the morning and spend the afternoon doing office work and planning our groups, then we do the XLP Bus at Hazel Grove estate. I will tell you more about the Bus in another post~
On Fridays we get a lie-in (yussssss) and go to Northbrook school for lunchtime pastoring, which is walking around the playground and getting to know the kids and being a friendly face for them to talk to. After lunch we then do the Bus at Milford Towers, the estate that’s built on top of a Tescos, then me and Ruth go to Ymad, the 11-14 youth group at church.
And that is my average week, although each day is never the same! There is always something interesting going on. Please email me and facebook me, coz I don’t have uber amounts of time to spend on msn atm.