A Fun Apostolate

Today I got to go on a special apostolate. I went with the missionary Florianne to the Sisters of Mercy convent, which is not far from our house here. We went to visit children who were there with an after school program. We helped the children with some homework and then it was story time.
I sat at a table with three boys. Edward and Thomas were both 8 years old and in the 2nd grade and Nelson was 9 and in the 3rd grade. I first helped them with some math homework. Fortunately, the math problems were easy enough for me to solve. Edward said that he wished that I would come every day because we finished the first problem quickly. However, the two following problems were not as easy and I refused to just tell him the answer like he demanded.
After we finished the math, we moved on to reading. I was impressed with some of the words that they could read although I think "audience" and "applause" were a bit out of their league. While we were doing the reading Amantha, or some name like that came, she was also in the 2nd grade. The kids were rather unfocused the whole time, but we finished most of the problems before reading time began.
Their teacher Mr. Johnson wanted to read to them a book about Little Bill and a new kid, named Michael of course, who comes to Bill's school and insults. Before reading the story, the kids were told to draw pictures of how they feel when someone says something mean to them. They were also supposed to write two words to describe their feelings. That project was more or less of a success. Less rather than more, but whatever.
I thought that the story was quite interesting and Mr. Johnson handles the rambunctious youngers quite well. The kids who were quiet during the story were given candy. Banana flavored lifesavers. I was quite jealous. After the story their was a little discussion of the book. Mr. Johnson asked if they would have insulted the bully Michael back. It turned out that most of them liked making fun of people and making them angry. Children can be quite sadistic it would seem.
Shortly after the story, it was time for the kids to go home. We said a few prayers and then left the class in two lines. I talked to a few more of the children before we ultimately said good bye when they met with their parents. I had a lot of fun with the children. Strangely though when I finally made it back to our missionary house, I felt rather tired. I didn't realize just how much energy the wildly energetic children sap from you.