Day 3 of Teaching: Red Bank Village

           The day began with a wonderful bumpy ride down the road to Red Bank Village and a joyous happy birthday song to Matt Huml in our van!  Our trip leaders are so supportive, and we were all so excited to share Matt’s birthday in Belize.  As we arrived in Red Bank and unloaded our materials, we all noticed that the temperature was cooler than normal because it rained last night! We are all getting used to the weather and agreed that the heat doesn’t bother us much anymore. 

          Today was my third day teaching the Infant IB class which translates to Kindergarten in the United States.  I had the opportunity to begin teaching the students about clocks and time, and today we made wrist watches out of pipe cleaners and construction paper. My students were SO EXCITED to have their own watches like “Miss Courtney.”  My students drew the face of their clock and included time to the hour.  Then they stood in two lines facing each other and told their classmates the time. Other than learning about time, my students also learned about safe and healthy environments today (learning not to litter), we learned “Sn” words, sang a ton of songs, and made Mother’s Day cards! 

         To top the day off, I taught music in the afternoon.  I brought my harmonica from home and introduced the instrument to my students.  My kids LOVED this!  When I played a high note, my students reached up towards the sky. When I played a low note, they got way down low. They loved bouncing up and down as I switched the notes very quickly and they all bounced to the beat. My students are so loving, energetic, and ready to learn.  I cannot wait to see what tomorrow has in store for us!

          I ended the teaching day by assisting Amber in her Standard 5B class (equivalent to 6^th and 7^th graders).  We drew mountain sceneries on cloth and then painted our artwork. Yesterday I had the opportunity to give these students letters from my 5^th graders from McFerran Preparatory Academy in Louisville, Kentucky.  They were so eager to write back their pen pals and even invited them to their village!  They wrote in their letters how they love to hunt iguanas, they like to talk like parrots, and they run like the jaguars.  These students are so smart and it is so obvious the love they have for their village. 

Off to eat dinner and plan for tomorrow!  Thanks for reading J

-Courtney McGraw Infant IB