A regular day l Josh

Today was a regular rotations day.  This means that a bunch of students will be sent off to schools in groups of four plus a chaperone (sometimes two, sometimes none) and the remainder stay at the base and work in the shop; building, painting and cleaning miscellaneous things.  Today I was sent to Haina's and taught with Billy at one of two school buildings. Both schools are Haitan schools so their first language is Kreole making there second language spanish.  So at ages 6-15 they are being taught their third language, English.  The kids at these schools are pretty amazing,  at such a young age they are learning a third language.  So Billy and I taught from 8:45ish straight to 12:00.  The only 'break' was recess but we were mauled with kids so I wouldn't really consider it a break.  To get the kid's attention Billy and I used fun games like Chicos and Chicas, Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes, and Duck Duck Goose.  We also would write common objects in Spanish and have the kids draw the objects and then write the English translation of the word.  Example; we would right 'cabra' on the board, then they would draw a goat and then have to write goat below their picture when they are done drawing. This was a good way to keep the kids attention as well as make them interested in their learning.  Quick sidenote, using this game I was able to find out that kite in spanish is "Chichigua" which was helpful because I looked through about three different dictionaries and couldn't find out what the word for it was.  They know their numbers, letters and colors really well in English which is neat to see because you realize that they know these things in three different languages at such a young age.  The school we taught at has about twenty-ish students of all ages.  The school is the front part of someone's house and on Sundays is turned into a church, in fact on March 22nd we attended a nighttime church service there.  It is amazing how much of a warm cultured environment ­­­the DR is and how relational people are here.  I don't think I have ever seen a church, school, house in Canada and I don't think I ever will.  After we are done teaching the five of us (Billy, Alexa, Rebecca, Dylan and I) ate lunch together.  We then had until 1:30 to roam the streets but as soon as we stepped out of the school we were cornered by two kids, one was eight and one was ten.  I also love interacting with Dominicans because it is great to work on social interaction with strangers and kids as well as using spanish.  I also love using every oppurtunity to better my spanish because being able to speak a second language has become a dream for me and using those oppurtunity makes the chances of this dream higher.   Kids here are always interested in meeting the white people, or the "Americanos."  At 1:30 we were picked up and on our way.  Totally out of context, we went paintballing that night, which was super fun, honestly unreal.  Alright, on that note I am coming to a close, I am enjoying it here! Thanks for reading my blog post.