As mentioned in yesterday’s blog, we had to get up at 6 today. (I had to wake up at 5:30) Knowing it was a long day we all needed to keep our energy high. In order to do this, we had a nutritious and delicious breakfast of gallo pinto, eggs with ham, pineapples, and a banana. After breakfast we went back to the hostal to have an academic seminar on education in Nicaragua. We were given the context of the education system here and we guessed on which facts pertained to either the U.S. or Nicaragua.

After the academic seminar we took a field trip (bus ride) to the Escuela Especial (Special Education) in the Sutiaba community. There we each paired up and got assigned to a specific classroom where the kids were working on things such as math and social studies. After spending time helping out in the classroom, we ended our visit with a piñata for the kids. Watching the kids have so much fun trying to break open the piñata made us feel very happy and grateful for the time we spent with them.

After our time spent here we took a bus ride back to the hostal and had a few minute of free time before lunch. For lunch we had rice, guiso de pipian, and a choice of barbequed chicken or beef and vegetables.

Immediately after lunch we went to catch the public bus. Being a group of 24, we had to rush inside the bus and we ended up very cramped with all the other people traveling on it. For some of our students, the bus ride was a whole new experience and very different from buses back in the U.S.

Our next activity on our agenda was shadowing a Nicaraguan high school student. We received a warm welcome and were split into groups of four and assigned to our classrooms. The students were very welcoming and were interested in what we had to say. In the classroom, we interacted with the students and participated in their classes. My group got to play some games with the students such as spin the bottle. I know what you might be thinking because of the connotation this game has, but in reality it was a game where we had to make the other say a difficult phrase in Spanish or English or imitate an animal. We then left the school and came back for an education debrief about our experiences in our variety of classrooms.

We had hot dogs for dinner and then we went to our second day of tutoring. We ended the day with the nightly meeting and self reflection, and now I am here writing this blog. Although it was a very long day and on a tight schedule, we managed to arrive everywhere on time and kept a positive attitude throughout the day. Overall, today was a successful and exciting day that we will keep in mind throughout the trip.