Portrait of a Roma Bible Club Leader: Vasilita Cobzaru, Republic of Moldova

 “She looked so happy. That’s how I saw her. Happy to meet with the children,” a coworker described Vasilita Cobzaru. 

It is fitting, then, that Mrs. Cobzaru is the first person profiled in this series on Roma and Sinti children’s teachers. 

In many ways, Vasilita Cobzaru is a typical Roma woman from the Republic of Moldova. Like many other Moldovans, she grew up in a village with unpaved streets and no running water. Like many other Roma, her first language (Usari Romani) was not the language used in the village school. Still, Vasilita got a basic education there in everyday math, reading, and writing—in the Cyrillic alphabet. At that time Moldova was part of the Soviet Union and instruction was in Russian.

Also, very typically, Vasilita married a boy from the same village and had four children more or less one right after another (photo:  Vasilita hand-sewing skirts for her young daughters). This, however, is where Vasilita’s story begins to differ. 

Her husband’s father was the first believer in this village. Night after night people would gather at his home to hear Bible stories and to sing Christian songs together. Many of those people repented, believed in Jesus, and were baptized. Vasilita and her husband Anatolie (Nicanor) were among those people. 

(Nicanor with two of his children and his father. You can hear Vasilita’s father-in-law tell his own story here How the church in Vulcanestibegan - YouTube, Romanian with English translation.)

“Twenty years ago when I became a believer, I wanted to do as much as I could to teach children about God,” Vasilita recalled. She mentioned the name of adults, now newly born-again. “ I put the small seed in their hearts.” (Vasilita, far left, with one of her children at an outdoor service, 2000.) 

For some of them, it took a long time for that seed to sprout. Vasilita and her husband also had ups and downs in their faith journey. At times they found it tempting to make money-related choices that would not exactly honor their Lord.  They came through those rough times with a renewed commitment to their Savior and their local church, Bethlehem Baptist. In an outpouring of love for Jesus, in 2020 Vasilita spontaneously organized a children’s choir in the church. 

Meanwhile, a Sinti pastor in Germany, Brother Kennedy Laubing, had felt led to invest in Roma in Moldova. He discussed different possibilities with Petru Ciochina, the pastor of Bethlehem Baptist. They agreed that an afterschool tutoring program would be very helpful. Would Vasilita be willing to turn her choir into a children’s club? Yes, she would. 

Would she be willing to add tutoring, perhaps basic literacy? Vasilita did not feel comfortable doing that. She learned to read and write in Cyrillic. Now the village school uses the Latin alphabet and teaches in Romanian. Vasilita can read in both alphabets but did not consider herself prepared to teach reading like that. 

Okay, then would Vasilita be willing to add a Davar: Bridging to Literacy game to each Bible club meeting? These fun, simple games teach and practice skills that we all need to succeed in school. Yes, Vasilita would definitely be willing to do this. Especially if her friend Alina Molla would coach her in leading these games.

Alina Molla is an experienced educator from Romania. She came to Vasilita’s village several times over a span of nearly ten years as part of small volunteer teams. Local believers like Vasilita and her friend Katea (both in photo at left) served side-by-side with these volunteers to share Bible lessons in Usari Romani, lead praise songs in that language, and prepare dramatized Bible stories. 

A couple of years earlier Katea  and a young man from the village had also volunteered to start a children’s club using Davar: Bridging to Literacy games. Alina, who had helped develop Davar, came to their first meeting to show them a few games.  The young man found the club too much to continue on top of his other responsibilities. Katea, who is legally blind, could not continue the club by herself. 

Katea was, however, as eager as Vasilita to help the children in the village. Together they faithfully led this new year-long children’s program. Alina met with them every week online to pray together, discuss the upcoming lessons together, and go through the Davar activities for week. 

This new children’s club began meeting several times a week in an activity room at the village school. The children responded positively--so positively that the school director became angry. More children came to this children’s program than came to school. Why did they come to the club and not to school, he wanted to know. 

Vasilita told him the club was from God. “God does that, that’s why they come.” 

A usual session consisted of prayer, the Bible story, and the games and Biblical truths Vasilita and Catea had discussed over the phone with Alina. In the first few meetings, Vasilita read the

Bible story from a children’s Bible in Romanian. She soon decided it worked better to tell the story in her own words. 

“Telling the Bible story in your own words makes it more interesting,” Vasilita noted. Since her own words were in Ursari Romani, it also made it easier for all the children, even the very youngest ones, to understand the stories and lessons.

Vasilita wisely used the games as extra motivation for the children to listen to the Bible stories.

“Listen to the story first,” Vasilita would tell them. “Then we get to play a game.”

The children really enjoyed the Davar games. They had no idea they were practicing school skills while they played. Everyone also liked acting out Bible stories. The children’s club did this at Christmas, acting out the story of Jesus’ birth. 

As much as Vasilita enjoyed working with the children, at the end of the school year she felt led to focus on outreach to women. During the Pandemic, the church had moved their weekly women’s meeting from face-to-face to online. God really worked through this. Many people from the village go abroad to earn a living. The online Bible studies provided a way to stay connected, even when people were spread from Siberia in the east to the coast of Holland in the west. The pastor’s wife had started the face-to-face meetings. Sometimes she led the online Bible lessons, sometimes the pastor did, and Alina was also invited to do a few. At the end of the school year, Vasilita asked Alina join her in starting an additional online women’s group designed for women who are not yet Christians. Alina leads these Bible lessons, choosing topics that the women request. The women then go on to sing and pray together for an additional hour . . . or two. 

Vasilita Cobzaru, a typical Roma woman, understands how to reach other Roma, whether they are children in her village or women scattered across Eurasia. She uses songs, prayer, and Biblical truth anchored in stories that are told rather than read. Most importantly, she sees God working through community. She led the children’s Bible club in the context of community—Catea in Moldova, Alina from Romania, Brother Laubing in Germany, and many others who prayed with and for her. Vasilita continues to organize online women’s gatherings in community with others to foster community among others.

This community is especially precious to Vasilita since she and her husband, like so many other Roma, have now gone abroad to work. She still looks happy, happy to plant seeds of faith and to join in Christian community wherever her Lord leads.

 

 

(Photo: a very young guest visits Vasilita and one of her daughters 
at their temporary home in the Netherlands.)

 

by M. VanRheenen

 

 

 

One-two-three Clap!

 Rhythm--clapping, tapping, stomping--did you know all that fun lays the foundation for doing math? I sure didn't. My friend Marleen Schönthaler, the educator behind most of Davar: Bridging to Literacy, had put rhythm games like
Repeat the Rhythm into Davar Start Games. I thought those games just had something to do with listening and concentrating. 

They do. But they do even more. When you repeat a clear rhythm, you are unconsciously counting. Kids who have never been taught to count can still accurately follow a rhythm like this one:  clap, clap-clap, pause, clap, or even far more complicated ones. This calls for a sense of how many, for a sense of--you guessed it--numbers. It is math preparation.

So while these kids are clearly having fun, if they were following a set pattern they would also be practicing math skills. 

Much more fun than drills like multiplication tables. Though there are Davar games that help with that, too . . . .

Series: Learning from Roma and Sinti Teachers who teach Roma and Sinti Children

 “Our children are everything,” a Romany* Bible club teacher told me. 

Another said, "I feel like my calling is to work with children. I haven't done anything else in my life since I was twenty."

This series will profile a few of these dedicated Roma and Sinti teachers. The teachers come from different countries (Moldova, Slovakia, the Netherlands . . .). They have different levels of formal education. They come from different church backgrounds. They speak different languages.

They have in common a commitment to serve God and make a difference in the lives of children.  "We started to teach children about having a relationship with God . . .. After twenty years, we see many of the children in church."

All of these teachers also have a deep understanding of the children they teach and the communities they come from.  

"We can understand their background, so we can speak on the same level, the level of their struggle, of their difficulties," a Roma  leader said. 

I have learned much from talking with these Romany brothers and sisters in Christ. I hope you will learn and be inspired through this series, too.

And if you know of a Roma or Sinti Bible club/Sunday school teacher who would be willing to share about their experiences, please contact us! (via comments or on our Facebook page)

Mary van Rheenen

 

OP TIJD BEGINNEN

Wat is op tijd? Een tijd op de klok? Als je er klaar voor bent? Als je zin hebt? Als je vrienden ook komen? Als het programma begint?

Op veel plaatsen waar relaties en gemeenschap belangrijker zijn dan kalenders en klokken, is de echte tijd om te beginnen wanneer de gemeenschap, de betrokken mensen, zich hebben verzameld. Wat bracht hen ertoe om samen te komen? Meestal geen vaste tijd op de klok.

Wij hebben gehoord van mensen die kwamen als het licht in het gebouw aan gaat, als de leider zijn auto er staat, als het saaie gedeelte van het programma voorbij is, als andere dingen klaar zijn.

We hebben er van geleerd:En als laatste, maar belangrijkste tip: Maak je zelf niet druk, herhaal voldoende en leer iets aan met een spel en een activiteit. Dus altijd dubbel. Op die manier als je een kans mist, komt er nog een.

• begin met iets leuks
• geef een visuele prikkel (licht is aan, auto staat er, vlag hangt uit, …)
• geef een auditieve prikkel / maak herrie (estafette met toeter, iedereen die er is, gilt zo hard hij kan …)
• haal de mensen op (maak een slinger van mensen, geef iedereen een hoedje)
• geef een beloning aan iedereen die er de hele tijd was.

En als laatste, maar belangrijkste tip: 

• Maak je zelf niet druk, herhaal voldoende en leer iets aan met een spel en een activiteit. Dus altijd dubbel. Op die manier als je een kans mist, komt er nog een.

Marleen Schonthaler

  Foto: Grzegorz W. Tężycki, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

START TIME

You’ve planned a program. You want to start on time. What does that mean?

Is the start time a time on the clock? Is it when people are ready to come?  When their friends also show up? When the program has started?

In many places where relationships and community are more important than calendars and clocks , the real time to start is when the community, when the people involved, have gathered. What triggered them to gather? Usually not a set time on the clock.

For instance, we know of situations where people gathered when they saw a light on in the meeting building; when the leader’s car stood in front of the building; when the boring part of the program was over; when they themselves were finished with other things.

What we, as clock and calendar people, have learned from this is:

• start with something fun
• give a signal people can see (light is on; car is in front of the building, flag hangs out in front again . . .)
• give a signal people can hear (ring a bell, set up a sort relay race through the community with a horn or other noise-maker, everyone who is already gathered shouts as hard as they can . . .)
• physically gather the people yourself (make a chain of people; give everyone in the chain a hat)
• give a reward to everyone who was there the whole time.
• learn the local rhythm of life and choose a time when people are likely or able to come.                                                                                                               

And the last but most important tip:  relax and repeat. Repeat the core content of the program several times and in several different ways, perhaps with a game or an activity. In this way, if one chance to share an important point is missed, you know that other chances are still coming up. 

 

Photo: Grzegorz W. Tężycki, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Be Faithful

“Never to give up," is Ivetka Olahova's advice to other Roma who are also working with Roma children. 

"Be faithful, and they will see the fruit of this ministry. Because sometimes they will not see the results. But if they will continue, God will bless their ministry. We need to invest in them. Serving the kids is difficult, but we need to do it with God and not to give up.”

Ivetka has been leading Bible clubs for Roma children for 21 years, first in Sabinov, Slovakia, and now in Jarovnice, one of the largest Roma settlements in Slovakia.

Note:  This photo is not from Slovakia, but it is of Roma children at a Bible club.

A Dutch friend and I were talking about the recent birth of a baby. The friend asked about the customs in
America--when do friends and family come for visite to bring gifts and see the baby for the first time. 

The answer is, they don't. That is not part of American culture.* 

Don't we all do just what this Dutch friend did--don't we all take our culture for granted? It's hard not to. We assume all the time that people will act in certain ways and will communicate in certain ways because that's the way we do. I recently read a module that highlighted this: Cultural and Linguistic Differences: What Teachers Should Know.

For example, most teachers in America come from white, middleclass backgrounds like me. We expect kids to tell stories in a linear way--beginning, middle, end. Frankly, I have trouble following other styles of organizing information. A Latino friend, for instance, uses a circular way of telling stories or explaining ideas. This has fancy academic names--which I also didn't know called--topic association or topic chaining. 

This realization makes me wonder whether she has as much trouble following my storytelling style as I have had in following hers. It also makes me wonder how, if I had students like her in a writing class, I would teach them to write in the linear way which is expected in most American academic settings while also honoring and appreciating the cultural style those students know and use so well.

Insights into this and related issues of the classroom as a foreign culture will be welcomed!

Mary VanRheenen 

*Dutch parents send out a geboortekaart or birth announcement card which includes times when people can come to visit. Guests who come op visite will be given beschuit met muisjes (Dutch rusk spread with butter and topped with either pink or blue anis-flavored sprinkles). Guests will also have brought a gift for the child (and perhaps also the parents). 

The first whole week or at least for the first few days the new parent(s) will also have a kraamverzorgster for whole or half days. This trained health professional will help them care for the baby, gradually having the parent(s) take on more and more responsibility. The kraamverzorgster will also prepare the beschuit met muisjes for the visitors. 

And instead of handing out cigars at work, a new parent might bring biscuit met muisjes to announce the birth and share the joy.