It's high time I updated my blog, as it has been over two months since my last post! Each time I've thought about updating, the many things I could add have scared me away, but enough putting it off!

My time in Costa Rica is swiftly coming to a close. With four weeks left before I return to California, there's still so much I want to accomplish, so much I want to enjoy! And yet, looking back on the last four months I've spent here, it's amazing how much I have changed and grown, in more ways than one.

First of all, I'm amazed at how I've grown as a teacher. I began my semester of student teaching apprehensive and anxious as much as I was eager ... I so wanted to serve my students well, a task which seemed overwhelming. How could I presume to teach them when I felt so unprepared, so unqualified?

Thank the Lord that I was more prepared than I felt. As a wise friend assured me mere days before I left the States, He had equipped me with the tools I would need, just as He had guided me in the path that led me to Costa Rica and to Lincoln. And my friend was right in assuring me that He is faithful in providing His servants with what they need to fulfill the work He has given them to do. The Lord alone could have provided me with the strength, patience, and perseverance that I have so needed this semester.

By no means am I satisfied with where I am as a teacher; everyday I'm made aware of ways I could improve a lesson, implement more effective classroom management, handle a situation differently, better inspire my students or tap their interests. Yet there are times I rejoice in the victories I have accomplished: an essay by a student demonstrating careful thought or insight, a particularly creative or piercing poem, even a remark in class that shows a student has been listening. Perhaps even more than these, the relationships I've formed with students, the playful banter during transitions, the conversations before school when my students greet me with "Hi, Teacher," and share with me their lives, the smiles and genuine "thank you"s I collect and treasure as proofs of the Lord's presence in my work, promises that my labor has not been in vain, that it means something, perhaps more than I may know.

Apart from teaching, I know I've grown as a global citizen; my horizons have expanded as I've explored and lived in a different part of the world. I recognize this expansion in myself now, but I'm eager to see the change more plainly when I return home. How will I see things differently, and what will I appreciate about my home that I took for granted before? I'm looking forward to finding out.

I'm thankful for the many other ways I've grown these past four months that perhaps I'm not even aware of; the things I've learned from the people I've met, the places I've visited, the conversations I've had, the ways my Spanish has improved! I'm so thankful for this semester, and I pray that the Lord will give me the grace and strength to use the last few weeks I have here for the best.

Thanks for reading!

~Heather

My Eighth Week in CR

I apologize for going so long without posting! Teaching is very time-consuming, as you can imagine, as is traveling. I'll try to be more on top of things in the future!

The past two months here have flown by; I can hardly believe we're halfway into March already. But the time has flown in a good way ... largely because I'm so enjoying my time here. I've been spending a lot of time teaching; while I haven't taken over completely yet, I've been teaching three days a week while my master teacher Jenny teaches Mondays and Fridays. This gives me time to observe her as well as other teachers two days out of the week, which is very valuable.

One of my favorite things I've been doing with my students so far has to be our poetry unit. This past week in particular we worked on content in poetry, including subject, theme, tone, and diction. We started by going over Robert Frost's poem The Road Not Taken as a class and then broke into groups to analyze other poems, several of which I found on Billy Collins' site Poetry 180, which I love. Each group of four students had a different poem to analyze such as "Hope" by Emily Dickinson, "Turtle" by Kay Ryan, "The Bagel" by David Ignatow, "The Bat" by Theodore Roethke, and "The Trees" by Philip Larkin. I tried to find poems that were fairly short and accessible to seventh graders and that included vivid imagery. Each group then had to create a "miniposter" using construction paper we had in the class about the poem, including its subject, theme, tone, and five words or phrases they believed contributed to the poem's meaning. The students ate it up. They seemed to love working in groups, and they were also interested in the subject matter of the poems; they seemed to grasp pretty easily the point of the lesson. After presenting their posters to the class, I put them up around our room, which finally has some color and shows the students' work! I could tell they were proud to have their work on display, too. This is definitely a lesson I will teach again.

I've also enjoyed teaching writing. We've only had time for one writing assignment so far, but I certainly hope to do more next quarter. The assignment was called "My Territory," and it required each student to write a five-paragraph descriptive essay about a place that has special meaning to them, that they consider their territory. We did most of our writing in class, brainstorming, writing introductions, and going over the five-paragraph essay structure, and I emphasized description and sensory detail, asking students to explain how things in their territory look, sound, smell, feel, and even taste. What makes their territory different than others'? If they are writing about their bedroom and they include information about their bed, desk and closet, how is their bedroom different than other bedrooms that have the same setup? Obviously if they consider a place "their territory," it must reflect their personality in some way.

The results of this project were impressive. Some students produced beautiful writing ... a couple about a grandmother's house, a scary one about an abandoned garage, a vivid essay about the beach. I learned a lot not only about my students' writing ability through these essays, but also about their backgrounds and their interests, as the assignment had enough structure for my purposes but also gave them freedom to write about a topic that held meaning for them. This is another project I plan to reuse in the future.

So there's some more detail about how my classes are going. Travel on the weekends has been fun as well. A couple weekends ago a group of us went to Monteverde for the ziplining ... scary but extremely fun and exhilirating. And of course the cloud forest is beautiful, like nothing I'd seen before. Tomorrow my family arrives for a weeklong visit; I'm hoping to do some day trips with them while they're here and possibly spend a couple days at Arenal, a volcano a couple of hours away.

Hasta luego!

Classes at Lincoln School

These last two weeks, my time and thoughts have been largely consumed by getting to know my five sections of seventh graders, which I’ve enjoyed immensely. The first week of classes I mostly observed; trying to get a feel for where my students were academically, familiarizing myself with their personalities, and getting acquainted with my master teacher’s teaching style. Seventh grade is such a fun age … they are beginning to discover their individual identities but they don’t have the raging hormones that eighth graders do. The group I’m teaching is especially bright and capable, too; I’ve already seen that most of them will readily rise to meet my high expectations. They are also at an age where they still get excited about learning, as long as their teacher is willing to put some effort and creativity into making lessons interesting. I know this will be difficult when the time comes to teach grammar (I think nouns and verbs are exciting, but will they?), but thus far I believe my lessons have been successful.

A little explanation for those of you who may be confused: Lincoln School is an international school near San Jose. All the classes are conducted in English (except for Spanish class, of course) and the students (as well as most of the staff and teachers) are largely bilingual. About eighty percent of the student body is Costa Rican, the remainder being American or another nationality. Most of the students, therefore, are native Spanish speakers, so that they speak to their friends during passing period in Spanish, but they’ve grown up speaking English at school, so their English is very impressive. Lincoln is a private school (and consequently quite expensive), so many of the students come from privileged families; their parents are very involved in their education and willing to offer any support necessary, which can be encouraging for teachers. I’ll be teaching English, which is the equivalent of English class in the States … since these students already know English, it isn’t really English as a second language as many of my friends in the US assumed when I told them I would be teaching English in Costa Rica. Just like English class in the US, we do spend time on grammar and sentence structure, vocabulary, and writing, but we also look at literature and poetry, which I’m most excited about. This past week I introduced our poetry unit with a poem by Billy Collins called “Introduction to Poetry.” I found it on a website my housemate Alyssa told me about especially designed for high school students studying poetry. The poem uses great imagery to describe the best ways to read a poem; I think my students enjoyed it.

I love my master teacher, Jenny, too. She’s been teaching for a long time and has lots of experience, and she has wonderful presence in the classroom. The students love her and respect her at the same time, a balance I’m striving for. She has been very encouraging and supportive and continually tells me how glad she is to have me.

The Lord has certainly blessed me with my students and my master teacher! Please pray that I’ll serve my students well … I love them already and want to give them all I can.

Thanks for reading! Que Dios le acompana (Dona Rosa, my host mother, always tells my housemates and I this before we leave … it means: God go with you).

Tortuga!

… No, not the Pirates of the Caribbean Tortuga, but a sweet proliferous bouquet of another sort! About a forty-five minute boat ride from the Pacific Coast of Costa Rica, this Tortuga is a tropical paradise sans pirates, the delight of which I breathed deeply on Saturday.
We had to be up and ready to get on the bus by 6am, earlier than a school day! Somehow all thirteen of us (four student teachers from Westmont and nine from ASU) made it to our meeting place on time, and we climbed into two fifteen passenger vans, not really knowing what to expect. We all wore our bathing suits beneath sweatshirts and long pants; it was chilly and overcast in Moravia, but we were crossing our fingers for nice weather at the beach.
Our hopes were not disappointed. As we got closer and closer to Jaco, where we would meet our speedboat to the island, the temperature rose, and long-sleeves and sweatpants made way for tankinis and board shorts. When we finally stepped out of our stuffy vans, the sun was out and incredibly warm. Everyone scrambled to apply sunscreen, as we had been advised that skin burns more easily closer to the equator.
After that, things only got better. While we waited for our boat on the beach, a few of the girls tentatively tested the water. Being used to the frigid Pacific a few thousand miles north in Santa Barbara and the melted-snow temperatures of the Mokulemne River in Lodi, I could hardly believe what my toes were telling me: not quite bath water, but incredibly warm and pleasant.
Next, we had a forty-five minute boat ride out to the island. I kept thinking … this is January, and I’m here for school, so how is this happening?
The island itself was exactly what you might picture a tropical paradise to be … white sand beaches, elegant palm trees with coconuts ready to drop, and turquoise water beneath a clear blue sky. Our guide, Oscar, drove us within sight of the island, but before settling there, we had something else in store … snorkeling.
We sped through the warm waves a bit further until we reached a few large rocks. Each equipped with flippers, mask and snorkel, we eagerly jumped in to explore underwater. I’d never been snorkeling before, so this was all new and amazing to me. Costa Rican sea life probably doesn’t compare with that of Hawaii or Australia, but for me it was bliss. Electric blue, orange, lime green, pink, yellow polka dots—there were fish of every color down there, as well as spiny puffer fish, eels, starfish, and sea cucumbers. I couldn’t get enough!
Back on the island, we enjoyed grilled fish and chicken with rice and vegetables, along with fresh pineapple (the best pineapple I’ve tasted is in Costa Rica), watermelon, papaya, and coconut. After eating way too much, we dozed under the palm trees listening to island music for a few hours before heading off to do more snorkeling.
Needless to say, despite being exhausted and a bit sunburned, we left feeling quite content and grateful for a wonderful day. I’d heard amazing things about the country before coming to Costa Rica, but it’s always better in real life. From what I’ve experienced so far, I can’t wait to see what’s in store the rest of the semester, not only in regard to traveling but also to cultural experience (I’m continually learning and developing my Spanish) and to my professional development. Tomorrow, classes officially begin at Lincoln School, of which we were reminded when we met a fourth grader from Lincoln playing volleyball on the island. I can’t wait to meet my students and actually start teaching. Travel is certainly fun and eye-opening, but even more so I look forward to the relationships I’ll be cultivating while here. Part of what made yesterday so wonderful was sharing it with friends … I believe I’ve been particularly blessed by the peers I’ve been given in my fellow student teachers.
Well, there’s so much more to tell, but I will continue posting when I get the chance. Until then, “Pura vida!”

Estoy Aqui!

Buenos!
That's short for "Buenos dias!" I've finally arrived, and so far I am loving it. These last few days have gone by quickly; this is already my fourth day here, and I'm sure the time will continue to fly by as I start teaching and become occupied with lots of work to do.

Classes start next week, but as of right now there is still so much to take in! First of all, I love my host family. There are three of us student teachers living with la familia Leon, and the family is so hospitable and gracious. Rosa, our host mother, cooks us delicious meals: gallo pinto (a traditional Costa Rican dish of rice and beans) for breakfast each morning, lots of chicken, tortillas, a really good lasagna, and lots of fresh fruit. For dessert after dinner we have plantains, which are sort of like fried bananas—they’re muy ricos! Rosa doesn’t speak English, but she understands us pretty well and continually encourages us to make her house our home, telling us to hang out in the living room and patio whenever we like. Jorge, Rosa’s husband, is also really kind and fatherly, driving us places and explaining things in English when we don’t understand. Rosa and Jorge have three children: Jorge, Mario, and Maria, all in their twenties and all of whom speak English very well. Maria still lives with her parents, though we don’t see her too much, and Mario and Jorge have their own place, though they are in and out of the house. Mario is great with computers and helped us get our internet up and running. The house is very nice; Deborah, Alyssa and I each get our own room, which is a luxury I wasn’t really expecting. We live within walking distance of a large supermarket as well as lots of little restaurants, and we can easily catch taxis and buses to get elsewhere.

On Sunday, we decided to explore downtown San Jose. We really aren’t very far from el centro; the bus takes us there for about 50 cents. (I think we figured out the bus system, but it took some trial and error. ;) ). Anyway, we wandered around downtown for a bit … they have lots of touristy shops as well as larger stores and things to see. We took our picture in front of the Teatro Nacional (I’ll have to visit another time to see inside, they say it’s very extravagant) and visited a big Catholic cathedral. I also got to try pipa, a fruit sort of like coconut. You hack off the top and stick a straw inside to drink the juice. Yum! And Costa Rican ice cream, helado, is pretty good, too.

All this week we have orientation at Lincoln School, meeting the staff, learning the rules and procedures, planning with our master teachers. It’s a beautiful campus, almost brand new, with a lovely view of the city and surrounding mountains. My master teacher, Jenny, is very nice and fun, and I’m excited to learn a lot from her. Next week I’ll get to meet my 7th graders! I’m pretty nervous about the planning part, since I’m not sure how to go about it, but the students will make it all worth it.

Well, that’s enough for now, I guess. This weekend the student teachers are planning a day trip to Tortuga, and island in the Pacific, so I really hope that pans out. Until then,

Hasta Luego!
Heather