In the past, missionaries’ children were almost exclusively homeschooled. However, many of our workers have more recently chosen to have their children attend local schools and use that as another way to connect with people in the community. This gives children a unique opportunity to learn multiple cultures and languages from a young age, as well as providing more opportunities for the whole family to build relationships.

The Davis* family has three boys, two of whom are school aged. They attend their local school in the community, Monday- Friday from around 7:30 am to 2 pm. Both boys eat breakfast and lunch at school, which was just one of the many adjustments they needed to make in the transition away from homeschooling. At first, they boys weren’t very excited to go to the school- they had difficulty tracking with the classwork and learning language at the same time and didn’t like standing out so much, being the only Americans. However, after taking a few weeks to adjust, they have grown to love going to their school. They are sometimes even disappointed when the weekend comes and they don’t get to go. Both of the boys have made great strides in picking up the local language, due to being so immersed in it during school. Even though they still draw a lot of attention they’ve each been able to develop a couple close friendships within their class.

Recently, the family’s middle son, Chris, had his 5th birthday. His birthday fell on a school day, so he brought in cookies to share with his class and teachers. His mom arranged with his teacher to have a small party during the morning break. Everyone enjoyed the cookies she brought, and the class sang “Happy Birthday” to Chris in the local language. His language teacher even got permission for them to leave early so she could take the family out to lunch to celebrate.

Many of Global Serve’s families on the field develop personal relationships with their language teachers, because they spend so much time with them. By getting to know their teachers, they can have more in-depth conversations, which allows great learning opportunities for language, and also sometimes opportunities to share about Jesus.

Since the Davis boys, and therefore their parents, are involved in the school community and have their own language teachers, it opens up the door for meeting more people and developing relationships.

With prayer and diligence, GSI and the Davis family hope to see many of these casual friendships grow and deepen, and for opportunities to arise for the Davis’ to share the Gospel.

* Names and places have been changed for security purposes.

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