Nearing the End

If you can believe it, tomorrow begins my last week of school. I have been insanely busy finishing things up at school and in our community groups, going to many a despedida (goodbye party), spending time with my Chilean friends and family, and applying to grad schools on top of it all. Here are some pictures for recap:

Adult English Class - Here some of the guys are watching videos of skits they wrote and acted out in our previous class. Considering the amount of English they knew when we started the class (almost none), their skits were awesome. Tomorrow's our last class... we'll be having a fiesta, of course.

Spanglish Speakers - We had our final meeting this past Saturday. Due to strikes in all our schools as well as at the local university, we had some frustrating meeting cancellations during this past month. Our final meeting, though smaller than normal, was still a lot of fun. We got some secret pen pals started and tried to keep the ball rolling so that this program can continue without our guidance. Hopefully it does!

English Club - This past school year I've had an English Club for my 7th and 8th graders that met every Friday. We played games, did some fun English activities online in the computer lab, and wrote to pen pals in the U.S. We had our last meeting this past Friday and did a review of all we'd learned, and they seriously impressed me with everything they remembered. I'm definitely going to miss this group.

English Poster Competition - Throughout the year my wonderful parents and sister sent me all kinds of fun gifts for my students, ranging from Spanish/English dictionaries to Jonas Brothers and Miley Cyrus folders and crayons. While I've given a few of them away, I held on to most knowing I wanted to do something big at the end of the year. I decided to have an English Competition in which the students were to make a poster answering the question, "Why is English important to you?" I got 36 submissions of amazing work and couldn't be happier or prouder of my students, and tomorrow I'll announce the winners during the morning assembly. Every single kid wins something, of course. The poster above is the overall winner, and the two below are second and third place.

This upcoming week is going to be bittersweet. I'm very excited to begin traveling and seeing more of South America, but boy am I going to miss my students and Chilean family. My school and host family both welcomed me with open arms into their communities and lives, and their kindness is something I'll keep with me for the rest of my life. After next week I'll write much more about that as well as the rest of my experience... until then I have many a despedida to attend!