People who support this work from abroad often ask what a class is actually like. Not the plan on paper — the real thing, in a real room. This is the ordinary shape of a Saturday afternoon.
Before anyone arrives
The teacher pushes the adults’ chairs back against the wall. Paper, a pair of scissors and whatever colours survived last week come out of a cloth bag. The lesson has already been read through at home, on a phone, some evening in the week.
They come in loud
Children arrive in twos and threes, some brought by an older sister, some on their own from three streets away. The first ten minutes are noise and greeting, and that is right. For many of these children this is the one place all week where somebody is pleased to see them.
Singing first
Always singing first, because it settles a room faster than asking for quiet, and because a child forgets most of what they are told and keeps almost everything they sing. Often it is Bible Muqaddas, which teaches Psalm 119:105 in Urdu.
The story
Twelve minutes, no longer. The teacher tells it rather than reads it, standing up, using their hands. The youngest sit at the front where they can be reached; the oldest are along the sides, where they have jobs.
The memory verse
English and Roman Urdu together, with actions. The verse goes up on the board and words are rubbed out one at a time until the board is empty and the class is still saying the whole thing.
Something made with hands
Paper, glue if there is any, and a craft that costs almost nothing. It matters that the child takes something home: a mother who cannot read will still see what her child made, and will ask about it.
Prayer, and then the door
A short prayer in the children’s own words, and then thirty children leave at once. The teacher stacks the chairs back and puts the scissors in the bag for next week.
Why we describe it plainly
There is no equipment in that description because there is no equipment. Every lesson in the free curriculum is written for exactly this room. If you would like to stand with a class like this one, the most useful thing you can do is pray for it by name.
