Take a moment to consider the origins of Valentines Day.

Before the day was high-jacked for lovers, it was originally meant for

close and trusted friends and companions.

So why not send a card to all your loved ones on this special day.

Even better, purchase your cards from The Stratton ABC Foundation online shop.

You will find a lovely collection of designs produced by the children at Stratton House Childrens Home, Chiang Mai.

They very much need your support so make both them and your closest friends happy and order today.

In an attempt to support, encourage and promote English language learning and use, within the surrounding communities, we have set up a new website, http://www.thaischoolsenglish.org. Through this site we are setting up individual sites for any local schools who wish to participate.

Already we have started sites for Huay Sai School and Pasak School, Lamphun. Its early days and we are still working on the sites. Eventually both teachers and students will be able to post on the sites. There will be links to useful English language learning sites as well as videos and exercises produced by the myself, Khruu Khemtong and other participating parties.

The official Childrens Day is on the second Saturday of January, but it came a day early at Pasak School with a large event held, to which several local schools came to take part.

There was a big turn-out and the many food stalls and attractions were kept busy all the way through.

All the children were very patient, standing in line with their respective schools on the sports field whilst the opening ceremonies were performed.

Once all the opening announcements were finished it was time for the fun to start and the tidy lines became a stampede for the games, on offer under the various marquees and of course, the free kanom.

Throughout the morning there were various performances on the large stage close to Wat Pasak.
It really is a delight to be at such an event and see the effort made by the whole community to make a special day for the children.
In between performances by children, from all the attending schools, there were prizes given away, ranging from boxed milk to big cuddly toys to bicycles.
The dancing shows were fantastic to watch and it was obvious that all the children had put a lot of effort into practising their routines and they should all be very proud of themselves.
I’m sure also that many teachers and parents worked hard behind the scenes with the wonderful costumes worn for the performances.
From the tiny infants, excitedly giggling their way through their acts, to the older kids turning in very laudable routines, they all put in a huge effort and made a great show.
The traditional Thai dancing always holds me spellbound when performed so well.
The girls from Pasak School did a fantastic job with their lively number(watch this performance on youtube).The lead dancer for much of the routine, Best, looked very relaxed and professional and has that killer smile to top it off.And I can tell you that that smile is natural, brightens my day everytime I go to teach.
Hope you don’t mind girls, but my personal favourite was the traditional dance and drum number. In the heat of the day I think these boys deserve a medal for what was clearly quite an exhausting routine for ones so young. The lead Drum boy pulled off a wonderful flowing performance as did the mock fighting dancers with their cymbals.

All the children appeared to have a great time.

 The Bouncy Castle was very popular.
In the marquees there were stands where the children could aim at targets with catapults;

knock cans down with balls;

throw hoops over bottles or roll metal balls onto targets.
There was a large marquee for the infants with lots of colouring books and lots of adults there to help and make a fuss of them.

 I also saw children playing some sort of board game that looked similar to scrabble.

The kids were treated to a fly over by a motorised paraglider,(not sure if it was arranged or not).
There was so much fun and excitement to enjoy that alot of children were ready for home by 1pm as the heat got ever more intense.
It was clear that the children in this friendly community all had a wonderful time as do thousands of children throughout Thailand during this great annual event.
Personally I think this day should be adopted worldwide…cliche or not..the children are our future.

I have played the flute for many years now, mostly for my own meditation. On Sunday I woke up in the mood to play a little in my room. Suddenly I heard the sound of our congas being played and then the Kan, and then the circular pan pipes. When I went to investigate I found the 3 boys playing a way and making quite an acceptable sound. I was especially pleased to see Jack playing the congas. He was holding a good beat and the other boys were following his lead.

Jack has some problems in many aspects so life so I was so happy to see a natural ability show through and will be doing my best to introduce regular music therapy into his routine.

Unfortunately we had had a few behavourial issues that meant that our original 3 children remained at home with House Mother Wasana.

I’m happy to report that the clear message that the trips out are a reward for good behaviour seems to have worked as things have improved again, with the children keen not to miss out.

As expected the children that did go had a wonderful time.

 We were there for a total of about 5 hours so they had lots of time to enjoy the water and run around and play inbetween times.

There was plenty of Kaow Pat in the lunch box as well as snacks and drinks.

Look out for the video link coming soon.

For more photos please visit our photobucket album here.

This a huge event, very popular with the locals, with hundreds of  stalls where you can find food, clothes, toys, etc.

There are also many ‘fairground rides’ , as well as several stages with live music acts.

Our children had a great time looking around this fantastic spectacle.

They had all received a little pocket money to be able to buy snacks or drinks and then we allowed them to choose a few fairground attractions to enjoy. They all did very well, considering the vast variety of stalls and tempting things, in not asking for too much.

During their time there they enjoyed rides on a merry go round and a ‘Big’ Wheel, and spent time in the Bouncy Castle and House of Horrors.

Tai and Dtu, the older boys tried their hand at bursting balloons with darts and Dtu managed to win himself a cuddly Panda, which he gave to his sister, May, who has also joined us at Stratton House.

The most popular event of the evening seemed to be a snake show we came across by chance.

Tucked away behing the food stalls young Jack noticed the snakes being prepared and pulled us towards the show.

I’m not quite sure ow I felt about watching the first section of the show which involved a boy, of about 12, baiting a very large snake, which I believe was a Python. The snakes very large fangs could done some nasty damage had the boy made a mistake.

Later in the show and older guy performed with a large Cobra, sometimes appearing to hypnotise it and other times outright baiting it to attack.

Certainly not something I want the kids to try at home!

We were told that they had 5 siblings and that their parents needed to work in Chiang Rai.The struggle to provide for the whole family and the wish for at least some of their children to have a better chance led them to contact us.
Whilst we were there a neighbour came to ask if we could help his son, Tai. Tai is a quiet boy, a keen artist we have discovered, and it appears that the main worry for the father was that they live in an area where it is common for teenage boys to slip into bad ways and he desperately wanted to keep his son away from this possibility.
With the evening closing in it was decided that we would visit the other children the next morning and Boon and myself went and booked into a small guesthouse in Phua.
With a seven o’clock start the next morning, we first met up with our liason lady back at the first village before heading off to Tung Chang, another 30kms down the road, and up into a nearby Hill Tribe village.
This was the most difficult part of the trip as the family concerned were asking for placements for  girls.
At present, whilst we are still in the registration process, and so without major sponsors, we have had to limit the placements we offer right now, to ensure that budget pressures do not become to great to quickly. With the two girls we had already agreed placements for we only had one more placement to offer for now.
We explained this too the family and let them know that there will be further possibility for placement once registration is complete and we can hopefully find companies that may support us.
They then had the difficult descision as to which child would come with us.
It certainly doesnt take long to make a decision on offering placement in such villages, when you see their living conditions.
Although these villagers clearly have pride in there homes and everything is made to look as beautiful as possible many houses have now proper flooring and where we were, one very basic toilet is shared between several houses.
It was decided that 12 year old May would come this time with the possibility of her friend joining us later in the year.
Also from this village we met 16 year old Dtu.Due to his families circumstances he has not attended school for the last year. With no schooling and little work prospects his family asked us to help.
It was a tearful morning as decisions were made and children boarded our bus for the long haul back to Chiang Mai. Nu and Soms mother travelled with us to see the home for herself before returning to Phua the next day.
And so we move forward to 2010 with a much extended family and hope that more of you out there find us and find it in your heart to help in anyway you can.

For more photos please visit or photo album here.

Last night was the first night of the ceremony, which involved several Monks from many different Temples in and around Chiang Mai. We took the children from Stratton House up, knowing that many of their school friends would be there.

I thought that we may see the start of the ceremony, but discovered that it would not start properly until 9pm, and by then we had returned to Mae Salab so the kids could get their sleep.

Still they had a good 2 and a half hours playtime with the other children there and May and Yong made merit by putting money in the collection bowls.

 This is a particular method of merit making and the smallest denomination coins are placed symbolically into each of the many bowls laid out on the tables.

To take part you pay 20 baht for a bowl of the small satang. There were other ways of giving, such as the slot machines that when fed played recordings of Monks giving blessings. There was also a catch net held by a group of straw village folk.

This morning was time for villagers to come to make merit by offering food to the Monks and listening to the blessings.

 All the school children were involved.

 Our lad, Jack, had taken 4 packs, prepared by Wasana, our house mother, and shared them with some friends who had less to give.

The Monks chanting was very relaxing and for a while I sat in quite deep meditation.

I am not sure how many days this ceremony will run for but was interested to see the temporary accomodation for the visiting Monks.

Very simple cubicles constructed with rough wooden poles and brown paper, straw laid out inside for sleeping on.

There was a big turn out and I felt lucky to witness this cultural event.

At the end of the mornings ceremony all the people stood in line, forming a pathway and waited for the Monks who walked through collecting the food offerings.

For more photos please visit our photobucket album here.

The weekend kicked off with us all meeting at Huay Sai School at 8.30 on Saturday morning.As well as myself there were also 2 Dutch ladies, both living in Huay Sai and an English Lady from a village nearby to the school,all going along as volunteer English language trainers.
We squeezed as many of the students as we could into our bus to help with the transport and headed off to the venue.

San Kampaeng Hotsprings is such a good choice of venue; with camping at very economical prices; the ambience of the gardens and of course, the luxury of the Hot Springs.

First job of the day was for Khruu Khem tong to officially open the camp, assign groups to trainers and outline the first days activities.
The ethos of the weekend was that above all it should be fun. All students were told not to worry about making mistakes with the language and not to take it to seriously, but to enjoy the experience of the weekend and the opportunity to practise their English with English speakers.

Each trainer had 10 or 11 students and we had a very good workbook to follow, carefully compiled by Khruu Khemtong.The day was split into short work sessions; both sitting with the book and strolling around the grounds for survey and map drawing;and freetime for both children and trainers to relax.
As might be expected, all the trainers found the first day was quite difficult, with many students very shy about practising their English.However, with the groups being mixed ages, there tended to be at least one who understood more and was able to help translate to the rest of the group.
As well as the exercises in the workbook Khruu Khemtong regularly led all the children in singing simple English language songs.
The children had plenty of time inbetween the ‘work’ to enjoy the facilities at the Hot Springs, paddling in the manmade Hot Spring ’stream’, wandering around the site when the work day finished at 4pm, swimming in the big pool.
In the evening the whole group gathered to discuss their day with Khruu Khenmtong working hard to encourage the children to use their English to describe their activities.

There was more singing and after dinner it was Party Time. Whilst the 2 Dutch trainers went home to sleep, Sue and myself stayed and Sue really got into the spirit of the Party with an impromptu dance that got all the kids on their dancing toes to.

Just before the party started, a large fire was lit and as the evening went on the children cooked kaow lam and toasted crackers on the fire.

They clearly had a good time and were a very social crowd.

I was very impressed with how much respect the children gave to the fire. With many rural families still using open fires to cook over the children gain that valuable lesson early on.

Karaoke singing was popular.

Although I was surprised to see the best singer hiding under a table whilst performing, clearly shy to perform infront of his friends.

 This is most surprising as I recalled having seen this lad performing with the upmost confidence at Chiang Mai Sunday Market some months ago.

When the party wound down at around 9.30pm the children went off to their alotted tents and for the most part settled well and were all very well behaved.
I got the best sleep I’ve had in a long time; maybe I should buy a tent and put it in the garden.
It was lovely waking up to the peaceful surroundings and relaxing atmosphere of the Hot Springs gardens.

Joining the children soaking our feet in the warm waters of the stream helped counter the chill of the early morning.

Sunday was much more of a free day and the first activity of the day was swimming in the pool.

Although all the kids were there it was mostly the boys that got into the pool, the girls possibly too shy.
After breakfast and roll call and singing the camp song we split into our groups for a final ‘work’ session.

Later, all the trainers confirmed having a similar experience in that most of the children seemed transformed in confidence and willingness to use their English language.
At around 11.30 the school Director, Mr Hirun Chainu,came to officially close the camp and to issue certificates to all children and trainers. 

The children also presented the trainers with handmade pictorial cloth scrolls with thank you messages.
I think Khruu Khemtong deserves much thanks, praise and congratulations for working so hard to produce an excellent confidence building experience for the students.

And I would like my group for being such fun.

I look forward to working closely with her on further plans for expanding on this experience and giving these students, and others, more opportunity to encounter situations where they can practise their English with English speakers.
If you are interested in volunteering, either as an English teacher or maybe even, planning ahead, you think you maybe interested in helping with next years English Camp then please contact me. Khruu Khemtong is keen on the possibilty of being able to accomodate more students on the camp but obviously this means a need for more trainers to make this possible.
In the meantime we would also be happy to hear from anyone planning on coming soon, who would be interested in teaching at a local village school. There are many that would welcome an English speaking volunteer. If you contact us here we can supply details of requirements for the correct visa and work permit, depending on your planned length of stay, and offer assistance in arranging these documents.

For all of the photos from this weekend please visit our photo album here