Calls from your girls this week

Dear Parents,

After what sounds like an amazing stay at the Earth Lodge, the girls will be heading into town this week. They've finished up orientation activities such as self-defense classes and sessions on group living. They've begun to keep track of their individual budgets and spending each week and started classes. The ladies have begun to work on their communication skills with school kids and at the market.

Precalculus Class at Earth Lodge

I know you are eagerly awaiting your first phone call from your daughters this week. It sounds like the teachers have planned to set aside time for the girls to call home tomorrow morning between 10am and noon CST. If you miss your daughter's call tomorrow, the teachers will ensure that each student reaches their parents in the next few days while the group is in town.

Your daughters are excited and perhaps a little anxious to hear from you at home.  They may cry when they hear your voices, especially with the first call home, even if they were whispering and giggling with their new friends minutes before the call.  They want to hear about what they've missed at home, and they sometimes don't even know where to begin when you ask them how they've been or what they've done.

Here are some things you can do to help:

   Reassure your daughters that homesickness is normal and many people experience this when they leave home for a while. Remind her that  homesickness is usually short-lived.


        Listen to your child's challenges and concerns, but don't let the looking back hinder her moving forward. Remind her that she is there to learn, and make new friends and grow.

        Establish a regular contact time but limit the number of acceptable calls. We think calling home too much or too little can be the most difficult for our students. During the semester, public phone access is not consistent, so the teachers will try to set up phone calls every 10 days to two weeks.     Setting up a Skype account is greatly encouraged, as you may have the opportunity to actually see your daughters if there is Skype at the Internet cafe. If you need any assistance with this, please let me know.
        Encourage your daughter to become involved in her new life and her new community. Ask about her classes, activities, and the other students that she's met. Praise her for her efforts to make friends. In particular, ask her about the bike ride, her favorite Earth Lodge dish, to describe Antigua, and about her favorite classes.  Ask her to describe one of the other girls or tell you about Tree Girl, a book she's reading for her English class.
       If homesickness has not improved after several phone calls, encourage her to talk to her mentor. Please follow up with the home office yourself for a progress report.

It's true, that this might not happen with your daughter, but it's nice to think about it before your first phone call.  Feel free to call or email us in the office anytime if you have concerns during the semester.

Until then, I hope you successfully connect with your daughters tomorrow, but if you don't get through, we'll work it out for you to try again! Know in advance that orchestrating 11 phone calls will come with a few dropped calls and possibly some crackly connections. Know also that we've got our fingers crossed here in the office and are hoping this all goes smoothly! Let us know how things go.

Cheers,
Jennifer