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English 101

This has been another eventful week for Kevin and me. In order to get to know our neighbors, get the community involved in an activity, and take advantage of our students’ summer vacation, we decided to offer some English classes. Two, to be exact. The first is for teenagers, which takes place on Monday and Thursday evenings for an hour. The second is for adults and it meets Tuesday and Friday evenings, also for an hour.

We’d heard from other community members not to expect too much of a turnout, that our neighbors don’t especially like to get together and do this sort of thing. So we expected small classes, but we were hoping for at least 10 so that we could actually do some interactive activities with them. We were astonished when 22 “teens,” or people ages 11-23, showed up for class on Monday. They were even pretty much on time, which in itself is a small miracle in Costa Rica! Tuesday’s turnout was just as incredible; 20 adults showed up and participated like crazy. Our four favorite students are our 3 host brothers (Carlos, Diego and Juan) and host mom (Isolina), who are fabulous students and love trying out their new knowledge at home.

We’ve started with the most basic things like greetings, introductions, goodbyes, professions and the verb TO BE. Our classes are very interactive and get the students up and moving, conversing and having fun. We got quite the compliment the other day when our youngest host brother said that he had never had an English class like ours before – he had never had anyone talk to him all in English and make him actually speak it. It seems like others must have liked the class as well; we had 35 excited “teens” show up for tonight’s class.

When school starts up in mid-February our classes will probably shrink, but we’re expecting that. We’ll be much busier too, but we’re hoping to continue with the classes for as long as people are interested. With any luck, when we leave in two years many of our neighbors will be able to hold a whole conversation in English. But for now, we’re content to hear them say, “I’m great, thank you. How are you?”

Comments

Heidi Michelle said…
That is so excellent! I wish I could come see you guys in action! Keep up the good work, yo!
January 14, 2011 at 8:38 AM
Tammie said…
You two are really connecting! You're both such talented teachers and communicators, I'm not surprised at your success.
January 14, 2011 at 2:58 PM
The Alaska Professor said…
Wonderful to hear of your new classes. I don't mind saying I'm proud of you both. As I've always said, Good teachers teach! and that's what you are doing. Keep up the wonderful work!
January 19, 2011 at 8:43 PM
Christopher Starr said…
What kind of materials does PC provide for your English lessons?
January 20, 2011 at 2:08 PM
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