This blog entry is long overdue but will hopefully give future volunteers a bit of an idea of what our month in Roatan was like. We only had consistent internet for the first few days of our time on the island, so I hope this entry will summarize the overall experience that we had. Lynette will follow with an outline of the curriculum that we covered and how the students progressed in our classes.
We arrived in Roatan on a Sunday afternoon and were brought to Profe’s house in Oak Ridge where we would be living for the next four weeks. I have to admit that I wasn’t entirely prepared for all that we faced in those first few hours. It was a lot to take in and the fact that Lynette and I spoke almost no Spanish certainly added to the culture shock. One thing we were happy to discover right away was that the family that we would be staying with was immediately welcoming and very friendly. Their house is modest by our standards but one of the nicest in the area, and we quickly got used to our new home. The children in the house were also friendly, inquisitive and made us feel a part of their family.
We met with Luis that first night and he filled us in on some of the logistics and arrangements that needed to be made. He came by a few of our classes on our first day of teaching but after that our run-ins with him were few. In hindsight it definitely would have been helpful to have an English speaking representative inOak Ridgewhile we were there. We found that communicating was difficult so most of the time we ended up figuring things out for ourselves.
After a day spent working out our teaching schedule with the principal of the school and the other two July volunteers Lynette and I were excited about our first day of school. Lynette had brought along tons of ESL teaching books and manuals, learning games (numbers, letters, shapes, colours and animals bingo just to name a few), pronunciation aids as well as plastic letters to make necklaces for the younger students. We also had a whole bunch of fancy pencils, erasers and bracelets to reward the kids who made the most effort (which they loved). One Friday night we had our whole home stay family playing animal bingo around the table which was a blast and the kids immediately got hooked on the educational game.
The teaching tools were incredibly useful and a constant source of inspiration for our lesson plans. We spent a great deal of time planning our lessons and took our teaching role very seriously. We had given up a lot to come down to Roatan, and we wanted the kids to get as much out of us being there as possible. This meant teaching morning classes (kindergarten or grades 2-4), coming home and planning/preparing lessons, teaching afternoon classes (grade 5 on Mon & Tues), more planning, and then evening classes. We’d have a late dinner and between the heat, the early morning starts and the endless energy of the kids we were fast asleep well before 10pm most nights. The work load wasn’t too much but it kept us busy.
As for the students they very quickly found places in our hearts. We learned many of their names in the first week and would say hello when we saw them in the streets and at recess. They seemed to be equally taken by us and would call out to us on the street and pile us with hugs at school. We were amused by their endless energy and the joy they found in even the smallest things. Despite having so little these kids are full of such happiness and we found this constantly inspiring.
When we did have some free time we’d convince our guide Bryan to take us on walks around town. We loved these walks as it gave us a chance to get outside of “The Bite” and see more of the surrounding area. This included a walk into the forest where we hiked and swung on great big vines. Bryanwould try his best to answer our endless questions about life on the island. We also made arrangements to leaveOak Ridgewhen we had a chance so we could see even more of the island’s diversity. On the weekend of the big soccer tournament we were happy to be inOak Ridgeto take in the matches and help out with whatever needed to be done.
Overall Lynette and I truly loved our time working with CANFF in Roatan. The experiences we had and the kids we taught will stay with us for many years to come and we’re both so glad that we took part in the program.
~ Ingrid
