Advice for a Newbie from an Oldie

It has been over a month since I was a Peace Corps volunteer, but I as I answer questions about my service it got me thinking about what advice I have for future Volunteers.  The Hubs and I brainstormed and came up with a few things we wish we knew before we started our service.  

• Bring a head lamp
• Bring a small towel-that way you don’t have to carry around nor wash a normal size towel (very heavy)
• Hard drive
• Water bottle that keeps things cold and doesn’t sweat (or hot if you are living in a cold country)
• Bring a huge supply of your favorite face was and shampoo/conditioner
• If you are missing an item you can’t get in your host country, don’t be afraid to ask people to send it to you
• Share the items on your hard drive with your fellow Peace Corps volunteers 
• a backpack that can hold a few days worth of clothes 
• think of what are things you love to do in the States and then brainstorm on how to do them cheaply and modified (i.e. exercise-I only ran in Peace Corps)

We still have the travel bug and keep crossing things off our bucket list

If any Returned or current Volunteers have more advice, write it in the comments

Evaluating my Peace Corps Service (PC style)

This blog was started in 2011 to document and share our experience with Peace Corps.  Our time as Peace Corps volunteers has come to an end.  I am struggling with wrapping my head around this fact.  While I plan and dream about our lives as grad students and full time employees again, I am struggline to grasp the fact that we are not returning to Costa Rica.  We have spent more time as a married couple and college graduates as Volunteers living in Costa Rica than in the States.

Officially Peace Corps Volunteers

The Hubs and I have discussed what we miss about our site, Santa Cruz.  Claro que sí, we miss the Ticos and Volunteers we have bonded with the past two years.  But thank goodness for technology because we are able to stay in contact with many of them.  But we also miss walking around town, the hospitality of Ticos, and their attention to detail.  We miss speaking Spanish and having a flexible work schedule.    

They let us all in 

As we closed up our projects, my counterpart (the local who I work along side with the whole two years of service) and reflected on what was effective in the projects we led together.  I was a Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) Volunteer.  So my primary project was to aid local educators in improving their teaching methodology and their confidence in English.  My counterpart and I came up with different ways to achieve the TEFL goals.  We successfully implemented spelling bees that are now required for all schools to participate in.  We led 9 conversation clubs so that EVERY English teacher in my region had an opportunity to speak in English for 40 hours (and get a pay raise) that included mini workshops on teaching methodology.  

My counterpart and I 

Peace Corps also encourages volunteers to do projects that are outside of our primary project.  With my background in education, many of my secondary projects (projects outside my TEFL project) had to do with education.  I created a teaching blog aimed at TEFL teachers, privately tutored students, and co-led a (community conversation club) for young professionals.  I also led a women’s workout group for a couple of months. 

Throughout our service we were required to report our activities quarterly: who was involved in them and what was successful.  Because of this and reflecting on my service, I have evaluated my time there.  While my secondary projects are harder to evaluate, I still deem them successful. 

Our community conversation club 

The spelling bee demonstrated the importance of English and increased teachers’ and students’ confidence, vocabulary, and pronunciation. 

Interregional Spelling Bee 2013

The teachers’ conversation club allowed teachers the opportunity to learn new activities to use in their class,  to get a raise, to practice their English, and to get together as a department and share ideas.

Two of the conversation clubs

My teaching blog has allowed me to reach teachers that I don’t get an opportunity to see but once or twice a year.  It has also been a one stop shop for resources for the lessons they have to teach. 

The main student we have worked with has improved his grades and increased his confidence in speaking English.

The community conversation club has opened doors for job opportunities for some of our participants. 

The women’s workout group was a space for women to workout without feeling scrutinized.  It taught them basic exercises they can do at home. The workout group also gave them accountability partners to take care of themselves. 

While I haven’t completed a giant project or raised thousands of dollars for a project, I still believe my time in Costa Rica as a Peace Corps volunteer was extremely successful.  I believe I achieved the three goals of Peace Corps and the three of Teaching English as a Foreign Language.    

Success is not deemed by the size of the project but the effect on the person. - me

And just like that, they are letting us out

Recounting my Peace Corps service

2 years 3 months.

27 months.

7.6 earthquake.

2 host families.

9 conversation clubs.

50 spelling bees.

8 cluster mates.

3 conference presentations.

36 Monday tutoring sessions.

2 sets of visitors.

3 trips home.

4 countries visited.

1 manicure and pedicure.

3 broken fans.

4 parades.

14 beaches.

3 Peace Corps trainings.

2 project working team meetings.

2 birthdays.
1 counterpart. 

2 graduations.

3 babies.

2 bee stings.

1 wedding band cut off.

3 allergic reactions.

141 teachers.

164 runs.

2 stolen items.

2 blogs.   

120 hours of language training

68 hours of Teaching English as a Foreign Language training

3 good bye parties

7 spelling bee meetings

Countless laughs

Countless hours waiting for a bus

Countless hours on a bus

1 (almost) Returned Peace Corps Volunteer

Our first day of being a PCV 

The first time we met our counterparts 

Content Wednesday

Today I am overwhelmed with gratitude about 

random facebook chats with friends 

dinners at my counterpart's house and playing with Mia the puppy 

a laughing husband in his school's uniform 

Spelling Bee meetings 

surprises from the host family 

Grateful Monday

Today I am grateful for 

the people that fill this office 

Beautiful views on my runs 

Landmarks directing visitors to our house 

Quick trips to Liberia for sushi, a movie, and air conditioning 

Movie rental store 

Random dinner nights with friends 

We went to a coyolera to try vino coyol 

Vino coyol is made from trees 

Thankful Tuesday

Today I am thankful for

Conversations between spelling bee kiddos from different schools.  

puppy time 

walks into town (they put molasses on the road to help with erosion and they dust)

grocery shopping and knowing the employees (notice how they put the carts in)

Gratitude Monday

The Hubs' Little Sister gave me a book by Ann Voskamp for Christmas a few years ago.  I devoured this book, and immediately started documenting the things that make me happy as Mrs. Voskamp encourages.  Then today I ran across this blog post by this cute couple's blog.   And just reading the short post about what she was grateful for put a smile on my face.

I have been wondering how I could document all my photos and memories from my Peace Corps   experience.  This blog is my story of this experience.  And while most post are dedicated to big events like the completion of conversation clubs, the next few will be about the little things I have come to cherish about my Costa Rica.

 This is my favorite road to walk or run down.  It is covered by overhanging trees and has a great view of the mountains. I like it so much I made my in-laws walk down it when they visited instead of taking the shorter path.  (It is not always this desolate, the Hubs was almost knocked over by a car on one of his runs here)

Seeing this dog everywhere.  Meet Three Tone.  He is a dog that we have seen wandering the streets for the last two years.  He was named as a joke towards me because I named a similar looking dog Two Tone when his coat was obviously  black, white, and brown.  (The Hubs and I tend to come up with names for random animals)

OUR ice cream shop.  The local Volunteers have started calling it that since this is the only place we take visitors for ice cream and smoothies.  The owner is extremely nice (he often gives me the leftovers from my small smoothie) and the prices are cheaper than others.   

Talking about Peace Corps

This week is Peace Corps week.  What is Peace Corps week you ask?  It is a week to celebrate the founding of Peace Corps March 1, 1961 (I didn't even have to look up the date!) as well as to celebrate those that are or have served in Peace Corps.  To me, Peace Corps week is a floor in which I can share what Peace Corps in the Hometown, in my site, and with friends and family.

Where I come from Peace Corps isn't really known.  Peace Corps is a 27 month commitment to work and live in another country.  The first three months of your service is dedicated to training you for your job, providing language training, and introducing you to the culture of your new home.  After three months, you are sworn in, saying the same thing Congressmen and women say, and move to your new home.

The time in your community is dedicated to the project you were chosen to do.  For the Hubs and I that was Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL).  You are also permitted to do secondary activities that have nothing to do with your primary job.  For us, that was tutoring sessions, community classes, and exercises classes.  While you live and work in your community, you also go to trainings provided by Peace Corps.  

As a Peace Corps Volunteer, your medical, food, living allowance (to pay rent and utilities) are taken care of by Peace Corps.  You get two vacation days a month for every month you serve.  So for two years of service you get 48 days of vacation.  (We utilized those days-check on trips to Panama, Nicaragua, and Colombia/Peru and home 3 times).  At the end of your service you get a reimbursement allowance to help transition back into life in the States.  

My Peace Corps experience has exceeded everything that I thought it would be. It has been challenging, eye opening, life changing, tearful, joyful, and fun.  

I know that when I return I will be asked questions about my experience.  At our Close of Service conference, we were encouraged to write down what we wanted to tell people about our experience on a flash card.  I will have to work on that before we return in April.  

In honor of Peace Corps week, please watch this video that two fellow Youth Development Volunteers made to show you a glimpse of Costa Rica.  Our home. 

click here to watch

Let's Start Talking

It is done.  Done-zo!  I cannot believe it.  What will I do now?  I have just completed my eighth and final conversation club.

What is a conversation club you ask?  Well, a conversation is a group that gets foreign language learners speaking in their second language. While conversation clubs can take different forms, the ones I facilitated were a five day credited course (meaning: the country's Ministry of Education provided the teachers who successfully completed the course with a small raise) spread out over five weeks.  The conversation club included fun activities to get participants talking in the morning and then mini workshops in the afternoon about teaching strategies.

The participants were teachers from our region.  We separated them according to what grades they taught.  I had four groups of primary teachers and four groups of secondary teachers. The groups were mixed speaking levels though.

The mixed speaking levels allowed for the participants to lead the discussions and activities.  My goal as facilitator was to provide the activities, encourage speaking, and answer any questions they had.  It was wonderful to see the participants stepping up and leading the activities and discussions.  However, with mixed speaking level groups there was the problem of the higher level speakers dominating the conversations.  While that did happen sometimes, I tried to combat the problem by giving specific speaking roles to participants, requiring a certain amount of times to talk each day, and asking the quieter ones to lead (after they ensured me they understood what is needed to be done).  I tried to never put the participants on the spot.  I would write and say questions, instructions, etc. then allow time from participants to discuss their responses with their partners or write them down.  I wanted to build the participants confidence and teach them strategies for doing the same in their classroom.

The afternoons were focused on teaching strategies.  That included lesson planning backwards, classroom management, classroom procedures, activity development, and pronunciation.  Again, as the facilitator I did not want to dominate this time.  The mini workshops were a discussion based format to encourage sharing strategies and tips with their fellow teachers.

The conversation clubs, along with the Spelling Bee (Part 1, 2, 3) were my babies.  I dedicated most of past 1 1/2 years to conversation club and Spelling Bee.

With these clubs, I was able to see HUGE improvements in some of my teachers.  I had a handful of teachers who were too nervous to talk the first days and by the end of the course was volunteering to led activities or dominating the conversation (I had to ask one of these teachers to let some of the other participants talk).  I enjoyed getting to know the 100ish teachers through this course.  I have made some friends for life.

These courses brought together teachers to share ideas, tips, and practice English who normally don't have this opportunity.  I would deem these 8 conversation clubs a success.  

The Hubs and I are in the last few months of our service.  I wanted to document my projects so I can show people what I did during my time in Peace Corps.  As we wrap up our service, there will be a few more posts about what we have done, plan to do, and just general things about our host country and service.

S-P-E-L-L-I-N-G Bee Part 3

How can I describe the Interregional Spelling Bee? 

With a smile spreading over my face as I over hear a 9^th grader teaching a 6^th grader how to use one of the spelling words in a complete sentence. 

With tears welling up as I see the three elementary students from Santa Cruz in the top 3 places in their age division.

With seeing Peace Corps fading out the Spelling Bee picture, knowing that Ticos will step up and lead the spelling bee in years to come.

With hugs and words of encouragement from parents and teachers to students who didn’t do as well as they wanted

With applause and every “You are correct”

With Santa Cruz participants holding the four of the top 9 places

With accepting their loss with grace

With accepting their win with even bigger grace

With students learning 600 English words to reach this point

With the thought of business owners and employees judging and announcing the bee next year

With smiles

With high fives

With conversations in English with all my students

With last minute studying sessions

With new friendships formed

With laughter about Guanacastecos getting car sick in the mountains

With talk of next year’s competition

To put it into one word the 1^st Interregional Spelling bee was a SUCCESS.  So many people invested in this project that only two years ago was a dream.  Students, parents, teachers, administrative staff, and volunteers worked many hours to make this the success that it was. 

This project started last year in a handful of schools that had volunteers in them.  This year it spread to over 50 schools and hundreds of students.

The trip to Los Santos was many students first time out of their town.  It exposed students to students from other areas.  This built friendships that otherwise wouldn’t have happened with students, parents, and teachers.

We got spoiled.  Grants and donations made the spelling bee free to all the participating students and one of their teachers. 

The day before the event we traveled to Los Santos to be greeted with dinner and some artistic presentations and stayed the night in nice hotels. 

The next day we jumped right in with the top three elementary kids needing to go to the secret word list.  Then the junior high group had a showdown between three students (two of them from Santa Cruz) for third place. And then the competition ended with the high school group demonstrating their firm grasp on the English language.

Next year will be even bigger and greater, and I am sad I will be missing it.  But so proud to be part of it this year!