Grati-Tuesday

Day one and two: Day 1: we woke up and went downstairs for breakfast (I realized very quickly since returning here that cold military showers are necessary twice a day). We had a hardy breakfast and headed off to Rosa Smester PS to teach our first classes. During our time here, we will be in three different schools (a different one every week) and we will also be teaching at the Outreach360 learning centre. We headed off to Rosa Smester and began our first lessons! We were all super nervous but so excited! Myself and my partner have grades 2 and 3 in the morning and my other teammates have grades Pre-K and 1 or 4 and 5. Teaching in the DR is very different than Canada and this was evident in our first class. Students were hitting each other, full on fighting in class while we were trying to teach (talk about classroom management...). We finished the first class with positive attitudes and headed to the second class. This class was a grade 3 class and they were very quiet when we walked in. Attention was on us and we were so excited! We began our lessons and class went fine. The students get SO excited and their behaviour comes off as yelling or arguing about who got the point in the game but it was all in good fun and we left class excited to return the next day. Story time: during our grade 2 class, Teacher Courtney got a little excited playing one of the games and spun around too fast and landed on her butt in front of the whole class. They thought it was hilarious and I could not for the life of me get them to stop laughing😂😂😂 We played outside with the students for recess (we brought balls, skipping ropes, bubbles and frisbees with us from the Outreach facility so we could play with them!). The schools are public and do not have a lot of money so school equipment is minimal or non-existent. We came home for lunch and lesson planned for the learning centre in the afternoon. These students are more advanced in their English so I don’t have to rely on my choppy, no-good spanish to help in the class. This program is full English immersion so it was exciting to plan for. The students arrived at the learning centre around 430 and we began songs as a whole and them split off into different classes! I saw so many familiar faces and loved seeing the progression in the students since I last saw them. Story time: Our learning centre classroom is outside in the backyard. During our lesson, one of the students decided she wanted to crumple up a piece of paper into a ball and start throwing it around. Soon, all of the students were up and helping this ball. Mallorie and I looked at eachother and started laughing because we were in the middle of the lesson and now the kids were up and throwing paper around. So we improvised. Thank you Western B.Ed. for showing me how to be flexible and creative. We took that ball, got into a big circle and started throwing it back and forth using phrases like “I’m throwing the ball to_____” or “I caught the ball”. Take what the students love and teach them through that. Story time: one of the students in our class raised his hand and asked if he could go get a real ball to play with. I said no because we were in the middle of the lesson. He stands up and says “but teacher, I need exercise” and I replied with “you look great!” So he grabs his belly rolls through his shirt and says “no teacher, I need exercise “😂😂😂 these kids kill me. We arrived back at the facility around 6 and ran across the street to get fresh juice! Mecho is a woman who makes the most AMAZING juice and she is such a wonderful lady. We were getting juice and about to leave when she asked me in Spanish if I was here last year. I replied with yes and she said that she remembered me LOL I you could consider me a regular over here at Mechos😂🙈 We had a debrief with the other group here and headed to bed. It was an exhausting day but it was a beautiful day. Day 2: woke up bright and early for breakfast at 8. We headed over to Rosa Smester once again. Our first class, grade 1 was amazing. The students were participating and eager and so quiet. They were raising their hands and they were amazing! Story time: one student at the back kept putting her hand up when we would ask “what color is this” and show them a color. She never got the color right but was so excited regardless. One time she rose her hand for the color “orange” but said “green”. We corrected her and made her repeat orange a few times. Every time orange came up in the future, she was SO excited to raise her hand and give the answer because she knew that this colour was “orange” in English. We headed to our next class, grade 3 and started our lesson strong. The students were engaged and excited. When they finished what they were working on, they got a sticker. OH MY LANTA. Don’t give stickers to anyone in grade 3😂 these students got so excited that we had to leave. They stopped listening, they started getting rowdy and Outreach had a policy where if the class gets incontrolable, the volunteers have the right to walk out of the class. The students quickly learned that we are here to help them and teach them and we told them we would be back tomorrow. The students were not bad. They were not yelling or fighting or anything but they were not listening and they were uncontrollable. These students are so excited to learn English and so excited to receive the positive feedback/reinforcement that sometimes it’s hard for them to control and we understand that. Recess came and we played with the students once again. This time, I played baseball with a couple of the boys and Caleb (Outreach360 leader). The language barrier was huge and we had no idea what each other was saying but we had so much fun and I think they were impressed when an “americano” (the white skin association here), hit the ball😏 We came back home for lunch and then lesson planned for the learning centre. We headed to the learning centre and taught our same students again. Usually the students either come Monday, Wednesday or Tuesday, Thursday but because there are volunteers here right now, all of them can come every day after school so they are so excited! In the evening, we came back to the learning centre and Yazmine was here!!!! I met Yazmine on my first trip with Outreach360 in 2016 and we have become very good friends! She grew up in the Outreach orphanage and then became a leader for Outreach. She is now working at a bank, has two beautiful children and comes to visit the facility to try to raise money. With this money, she wants to open a “home” learning centre for children who are too young to attend the learning centre at Outreach360. She is AMAZING and I adore her❤️ Tonight, we lesson planned for the whole day tomorrow because we are going to the beach in the afternoon (YAY😍). This trip has been unreal so far and words cannot express how thankful I am for this organization and what they are doing to empower the children here in Monte Cristi, DR and in Jinotega, Nicaragua❤️🌎 Talk soon,