Today was our first full day in Costa Rica! We started off by getting to sleep in a little after our late night yesterday. After breakfast, we went to Del Mar Academy. It has a large, half-outside campus, which was really beautiful. We got a tour and then jumped right into taking classes with the students.
During the two classes we took with them we all split up into different tables so that we could talk to some of the students. I was surprised to learn that most of them spoke English, Spanish and were learning or already knew another language. This made it pretty easy to communicate, and most of the students were more than happy to talk with us and tell us about their school. It is a Montessori IB school, and we were shocked to learn how similar it is to Post Oak.
Our first class was art with the 8th through 10th graders. The project was to each paint a small oxcart wheel to be used later for a project the class was making. The students showed us how to do the first part, and then we got to use our own patterns for the details. After this we ate lunch and played basketball with the students. Apparently knockout is a common game everywhere.
After lunch and recess we went to a 9th grade social studies class. They were working on a project to put pressure on the government to pass a law banning single-use plastic. It reminded me a lot of an IHSS challenge project. The group of girls I worked with was making an informational video about the law that challenged people to reduce their own use of single-use plastic. Destiny also showed them how to use iMovie so that they could teach it to the rest of their class.
Throughout the day we learned a lot about the school and became more and more convinced that it was so similar to our own. We had a really great time and are very excited to go back tomorrow.
On our way home we bought coconuts and got to drink the water out of them which was amazing. Once we got back we went swimming in a super fancy pool on top of the mountain next to where we’re staying. After that we ate dinner and went out and got smoothies. Overall, it was a great day.
I think that this day connects to Creativity and Learning Outcome 1: Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth. In the art class especially, we had to be creative with our project. Art is not my strong suit, but I can still come up with a lot of ideas, I just have more difficulty pulling them off. Another challenge is my Spanish skills. I was expecting the students to speak only spanish, and I felt like I would not be able to communicate with them. This trip made me more motivated to get better at Spanish.
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