Well here I sit in St. Elena listening to Boney James and appreciating the sound of rain on the rooftop of this unique internet café. Someone has converted an old American amarillo school bus into a very pleasant and cozy café. All the seats have been removed and lighting is provided by somewhat attractive lamps at each computadora station on one side of the aisle. On the other side of the aisle, there are grande comfortable chairs for reading, if one needs to prepare work before paying for internet service. Beside the bus, is a small office with free coffee and a laundry service. They are washing and drying my laundry for a whopping 50 cents per pound. What a great place to be at this moment.
St. Elena is a tourist town situated in a cloud and it does rain every dei. That slows no one down. We experienced our second earthquake today—just a few tremors. This weekend we will travel to La Fortuna and hopefully visit Arenal Volcano—although lately the rocks surrounding the top of it have become loose and tumbling down. We continue to watch the news to see what will happen next.
Monday we visited a primary school here and will return tomorrow. The school has a small flower garden, a small vegetable garden, and a gorgeous maintained trail through a forest area. They believe in experiential learning when it comes to environmental education.
My host familia is a very warm group of people, but wow do they have lots of people in and out every evening! The fifth grade son is a blessing for me because he speaks English. He asked me if I would cook dinner one night so he could experience some American food. I’ve been trying to offer suggestions of American food that the family might enjoy and am planning to celebrate Memorial Day by preparing and sharing dinner with my new Tico (Costa Rican) friends.
My host Mom would like to learn Ingles because she has a couple of apartments and wants to rent to more tourists. She feels the need to learn Ingles so she often engages in conversation with me and uses my diccionario often. She also loves to cook so we have been talking a lot about food and cooking. Since this family provides more opportunities for talking, my Spanish is slowly coming along at home. In my Spanish class, it is still a challenge to get the pronunciation and accent correct. When we read aloud, my teacher sometimes skips over me or often gives me a shorter passage since I make so many blunders. I know how students must feel when they think the teacher, on occasion, does not have confidence in their attempts at the assignment. In my opinion, it is without doubt, incredibly important to offer encouragement and support when a student is vulnerable in a new learning environment and is challenged by the assignment. Today we were given a one page reading assignment that proved to be difficult for all of us in the class. Our first reaction was to work together and with our combined efforts tackle the piece. However, our instructor would not allow. We are not allowed to use any English and we do this from 1:00-5:00 every week day with one 20 minute break. I am very empathetic to students in any classroom who are feeling challenged and long for some help. Today, I tried to imagine my scenario in a classroom back at home, and I know there have been times when ‘no talking’ has been stressed when students may have wanted to sincerely help one another with an assignment. Cooperative learning has a place in the classroom. I understand the rationale of setting standards so students will rise to the occasion, but today I certainly understood the glazed eyes and exercised daydreaming as a coping technique while longing for the bell to ring. I really do not feel like doing my homework tonight.
C’est la vie and as one famous heroine affirmed, “Tomorrow is another day!” Buenas Noches.
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