#20. It's a Great Big World.

As a student, I loved getting new school supplies every year.  As a teacher, I loved it even more!  :-)  In fact, my mom and I would still go shopping together every tax-free weekend.  This year, I got to buy my school supplies in France, which was a whole new experience.

Here is a photo of my new “pocket” French dictionary…a gift from the university!  Also, check out my sweet new pencil case in the background.  Correction…pen case.  “En France, on utilise toujours un stylo” (professor at the university).

Other than my stylo case, I actually found the process of French school supply shopping to be a bit overwhelming.  Why can’t you buy a notebook with pages that tear out?  Why don’t the folders fit inside the binders?  Why do the binders have 4 rings instead of 3?  If one is going to make a binder with 4 rings, why sell a hole punch that only punches 2 holes at a time?  If one is going to sell a hole punch that only punches 2 holes at a time, why not make the adjustable ruler go all the way through so that a person with some perfectionist tendencies can make sure the top half of her paper is as evenly punched as the bottom half?

Of course, in the grand scheme of things, none of these details really matters.  I am thrilled to be here in France, learning both the language and the culture.  The US is a big country, but the world outside of it is a whole lot bigger.  And the more people I meet here who are from all over the world, the more I appreciate the greatness of my God who created and cares for every tribe, tongue, people, and nation.  English is a pretty widely spoken language, but not everyone here speaks it.  So even though my French isn’t great yet, I think it’s pretty awesome that having this language in common with my classmates allows me to communicate with people from places I’ve never been and may never be able to go.

“The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’”  -Acts 17:24-28

P.S.  I finally found a “folder” I can put inside my binder!

#19. "Wait Time" is Important.

There is a term in education called "wait time," which refers to the amount of time between the teacher asking a question and eliciting a response from the student.  I was taught to allow at least 7 seconds "wait time."  That's not much in the grand scheme of things, but when you are silently staring at a room full of middle schoolers, 7 seconds can feel like an eternity.  The theory behind "wait time" is that it gives all students the opportunity to process the question and formulate a response before the teacher calls on someone.  Inevitably, though, what happened when I really did wait that long is someone would say, "Umm...what was the question?"

Sigh.

It was hard for me to wait, and it still is.  Waiting feels passive, and I want to be doing something.  I want to feel like I'm moving forward.  But sometimes, in education as well as in life, a period of "wait time" is exactly what we need in order to move forward.  There are lessons we learn in our wait time that we just couldn't if we didn't have time to process what is happening.  

For the past couple of years, I have been waiting and waiting to return to France...and now I'm finally here!  :-)  But that doesn't mean the waiting is done.  On the contrary, I have a new set of things to wait for:  waiting for an email to confirm an appointment, waiting to see a friend, waiting for the bus or the Métro, waiting for the day when I might be able to express myself freely in French.  In each "wait time," though, I can be confident that God has something to show me.  And when the time is right, He can and will act swiftly (see Isaiah 46:11, Isaiah 48:3, Habakkuk 2:3,14).  And then...it will be on to the next wait time.

Waiting at the bus stop...