Our goal today was to get to at least two schools before the end of the school day. We rose early and had to skip breakfast so that we could get to the first school early. The village of Las Juntas del Sur is off the main highway by 2 kilometers. The single lane road is deeply rutted. Patrick was driving and was sure that we were headed to a dead end. We asked some men how to find the school and they pointed us another 100 meters down the road where there was a concrete bridge without sides. Crossing it, we drove up a small hill to find the school.
In the school were 12 children, spanning each grade from first to sixth. The teacher, Lupita, was immediately suspicious. She treated us like telemarketers! She kept asking if the books were free, whether the government knew about our project, why we were doing this, etc. I finally remembered that I had kept the Recognition Certificate that the district governor gave me two years ago. I showed her that and she relaxed.
The kids were unsure about what to think, as always. The funniest thing for me is to watch their faces as I speak. My Spanish is adequate for meaning, but is pretty ridiculous to them. I can see them wanting to laugh, but knowing it would be rude, so they cover their mouths and grin at each other with their eyes. We explained the levels of the books, how to pick “just right” books, how to check them put and how important it was to always bring them back. I acted out taking a first grade book to my house and reading it. I tried to go over the top with my playacting so they would know it was OK to laugh. We couldn’t spend a lot of time with the kids because we wanted to get to the next school in enough time.
The school at El Columpio had two rooms and two teachers. In one room were the first and second grades, with grades 3-6 in the other room. The kids were at lunch/recess when we arrived, so we visited with the teacher, Eduardo, for a while. He was the kind of teacher you hope your kids will have – engaged, smart, creative and a great manager of kids. The kids were having a wonderful time and followed all of his instructions respectfully. I’ve been to two room schools that were out of control, so I know that he had done a lot of ground work in rules and procedures. We gathered all of the kids in one room after lunch and presented the libraries to them, with the same spiel. This time we could relax and enjoy our visit. I sat and read aloud a few books to a group of first graders; Joan and Patrick played Spanish/English games with the kids using picture books; Mike has some fun math apps on his phone which he used to teach and engage the math wizards in the room.
Eduardo had a couple of surprises for me. Surprise number one – he has just started a reading log for the students. They were required to read an hour every night at home with parent signature. He had been working since September to sell the parents on the importance of reading at home and had just begun the log the day before we arrived. He was thrilled that the kids would have something more than schoolbooks to read. The second surprise was that he belonged to a group of teachers in Puerto Vallarta that made music. He gave me a CD of music from the Revolution. I haven’t listened to it yet, but I’m thinking it might make the next lunchroom CD.
We were exhausted, but had promised to visit with my Uncle Mel and Aunt Barb. We stopped for lunch, our first meal of the day, and then returned to P.V. for a visit with the family. We will be leaving for Cabo early Thursday morning and have an exciting time planned – we will be taking a boat to our next two schools, because they aren’t accessible by road! Tune in for more stories.
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