Newsletter of Tanya Spronk Spring 2019

Serving with Wycliffe Canada in South Sudan

Tanya’s Times
Happy (late) Easter!
I celebrated Easter this past weekend at a sunrise service on the banks of the
Nile River in Juba, with an assembly of people from all around the world. As the
sun rose over the trees on the opposite bank of the Nile, we reflected on how
Jesus was no longer in that tomb, but is alive, and His light is shining here in
South Sudan. He has risen and He is here, with us, bringing light where there
sometimes seems to be no light. South Sudanese are still feeling the effects of
conflict and displacement, and still struggle to feed their families, and find good
medical care and education. But Christ is here and He is at work. It was
encouraging and refreshing to meet together with a group of believers, early on
Easter Sunday morning, to reflect on what He’s doing in and through us all here!
I admit, too, it was especially “real” to me this year, as we read the stories about
Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane and His followers seeing the stone
rolled away from the tomb in the garden…. Because I had an amazing
opportunity to see those places in Jerusalem with my own eyes in April! So as
we read, I could picture more vividly what those places may have looked like all
those years ago. Some friends of mine who used to live in Juba are now living In Nazareth Village with a
and working in Jordan, and they invited me to come visit them and travel with shepherd, dressed as they would
them to Jerusalem. It was a bit of a last minute trip, but things just fell into have during Jesus’ day!
place so well , and I had an amazing and wonderfully refreshing time there. It
was the perfect mix of time spent with old friends (and their 3 cool kids, aged 5, Prayer Points:
8, 9!), experiencing some Biblical historical sites, relaxing in nature, munching on
 Give thanks for a 2 year
tasty Middle Eastern food; balanced with things I enjoy when I have a break
Residence Permit! Up to
from Juba such as Starbucks, hash browns from McCafe and grocery stores filled
now, the longest visa I’ve
with cheese! had has been 1 year.

It’s all in the details  Give thanks for a

refreshing time away
I’ve had a lot to give thanks for in the last few months! For the first time ever, I with understanding
was given a 2 year Residence Permit! It took visits to about 17 different offices, friends!
some on multiple occasions, but knowing that I don’t have to go through that
 Pray for the on-going
again until February 2021 is a happy thought! I had also been a bit nervous
process to bring peace in
about meeting with the new Undersecretary in the Ministry of Education last South Sudan.
month, since he’s such a key person in supporting SIL’s stay in this country, but
 Pray for the new
turns out he’s a child-hood friend of our Associate Director! And my bread
communities we’re
machine stopped working (I know it’s not vital to life, but having a loaf of bread
working with: the Lango-
sometimes makes life so much better!), just at the same time that my neighbour
Lokwa and the Pari.
repaired one that was being thrown away - so I can still make my bread and
pizza dough. These things have reminded me that God is taking care of the  Pray for good
details, right down to my morning toast! relationships with
Ministry of Education
and other partners.
 40 Trainers of Teachers Trained
The 40*C temperatures in February
sapped our energy as we trained 40 people
to go out and train teachers to use the
Primary 1 (Grade 1) materials that we had
developed in late 2018. These 40 trainers
came from 5 different language groups,
and were tasked with going out to train 25
teachers each in their home language
areas. These 1,000 teachers will be using
the new materials in their classrooms as
part of the pilot phase of the project. We
hope to get some good feedback from
these teachers, which will help us improve
the materials before they are developed in
more South Sudanese languages.
The training was actually a lot of fun! We
had a lot of “practice” teaching sessions,
where we all got to participate in the
various literacy games and fun activities
found in the textbooks. While I developed
most of the training materials, I had a lot
of help in the facilitation of the two week
course from some SIL colleagues who
came from Kenya and Senegal to assist me.
We got a lot of good feedback from the
participants in the workshop, and it was
encouraging to see that during our time
together, they were really convinced of the
value of using their own languages for
early education, and saw how much more
learning can take place when children can
understand the language being used in the
classroom.

“I never felt bored as we learned and practiced the approaches. Our languages
allow for much more interesting teaching in the classroom!” Workshop Participant

Contact Me!
Coming Up...
Wycliffe
On the horizon is more work with the Ministry of Education, to develop P2 (Grade 2)
4316 10th St. NE
materials, as well as helping more languages develop the same P1 materials that were
Calgary, AB started in 5 languages last year. This project involves a number of partners, so takes
T2K 6K3 quite a lot of time with meetings, emails and skype calls to ensure that all of the
partners are happy and have given the input that is needed. My networking and
advocacy skills get quite a workout in some of these interactions, but I know the
PO Box 628200
results will be worth the effort! I actually really enjoy getting more into the NGO
Orlando, FL world, interacting with other organizations that are implementing literacy and
32862-8200 education programs, supporting them with resources and ideas to help them better
deal with language issues in their own projects.
Home Address: This is all in addition to continuing to work with more “traditional” SIL language teams
151 Valley Ridge Green NW who are doing their literacy work along side their Bible Translation projects. With
these teams, I’m generally helping them to update their websites with literacy
Calgary, AB
materials, doing some planning for the coming year with some other language
T3B 5L6 communities, and assisting with developing new materials (for example, we just
tanya_spronk@sil.org completed a new book that will help Bongo people who have been educated in
trspronk@gmail.com English to apply those literacy skills to reading and writing their own language).

I’m also preparing to present a paper the Pan Africa Literacy for All Conference in
www.wycliffe.ca Kampala, Uganda in August. This conference will be a great chance to learn about
www.sil.org what other people are doing in literacy in other parts of Africa, and hopefully get
some new ideas that can be used here in South Sudan.

As usual, I’ll end with some appreciation all of your continued and faithful support and
prayers… even after all these years! Peace, Tanya
2
So many scripts, both ancient and modern, made my linguist heart go pitter-patter in Jordan and Israel! The Church of the Pater-
Noster on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem was a highlight for me! They have mosaic tiles of the Lord’s Prayer in over 100
different languages.

Three very different religions and traditions coming together in one place: Jewish people praying at the Western Wall; the Dome
of the Rock mosque; the Garden Tomb where Jesus may have been buried. I learned a lot in a short time in Jerusalem!

I hiked
around
Petra and
camped in
the wide
open spaces
with the
camels in
Wadi Rum.
 I attended the celebration for the launch of the new
curriculum here in South Sudan. This is the curriculum
that I’ve been involved with for the past few years, so it’s
great to see it actually getting into the schools! The Vice
President was at the celebration as the guest of honour.

During our Training of Trainers workshop, participants spent a lot of time looking through the new Teacher’s
Guides and Student Books, preparing themselves to train P1 teachers to use the materials in the classrooms.

I also represented SIL* at a conference for

mission organizations working in South Sudan,
which focused on working together to reach
the unreached people in this country.
Everyone agreed that language issues and Bible
translation are key! It was encouraging to hear
more about what God is doing here.

* SIL is Wycliffe’s field work partner

organization that I work with here in South
Sudan.