Estimating
that this is my tenth trip to Nicaragua in five years, I am feeling immense
gratitude being here again. In a way,
this “place” seems like “home” but it is actually the connections made with people that make León feel like “home.” The
teachers at the school, the deaf students, the visiting professors at la Casa
de Protocolo and... even Doña Maria all make being in León such a blessing.
Dr. Ann Coyne,
a.k.a Anita, has been invested in Nicaragua for 25 years. Beginning with
Witness for Peace, she has certainly witnessed many changes in the people and
the country. Ann is supervising two UNO
students completing their practicum in social work and has spent the summer in
León again. While here she has earned an
honorary doctorate from UNAN-León but has won even more hearts from the
Nicaraguans.
My daughter
Maia made this trip with me again. It is
her 3rd time and she is in love with the students. She was ready to go to the school four hours
before it opened. Once we got there, the kids were overjoyed and immediately
asked for “chicle” (gum.) Lucky for
them, we brought 4 big boxes of gum for teachers to use as reinforcers over the
next few months.
Maia was absolutely overcome with joy when she saw a teacher using the activity Maia introduced last year. Maia made magnets with vocabulary words that could be used to make sentences.
I bought some puffy, sticky letters at a garage sale for the students to use in making their names. There is a new girl named Keyssi who is five years old and has been at the school just one month. INCREDIBLE! I was able to see her use classifiers and language expansion that one might see in a deaf child of deaf parents. Keyssi told us how her mom would be so proud of her work using the letters—and her facial expressions were perfect. Keyssi even joked about one of the boys stinking because he farts so much. She would touch my face to get my attention which is a common behavior among deaf children and she would share all her joy with everyone around her.
I bought some puffy, sticky letters at a garage sale for the students to use in making their names. There is a new girl named Keyssi who is five years old and has been at the school just one month. INCREDIBLE! I was able to see her use classifiers and language expansion that one might see in a deaf child of deaf parents. Keyssi told us how her mom would be so proud of her work using the letters—and her facial expressions were perfect. Keyssi even joked about one of the boys stinking because he farts so much. She would touch my face to get my attention which is a common behavior among deaf children and she would share all her joy with everyone around her.
Maia also
used jump ropes with Nubia’s class to help review math facts. The girls were enjoying this but the boys
were so clumsy and uncoordinated. These
students are 10-11 years old but were working on basic single digit addition
facts. Maia would tell them “2+2= “ and
the students would need to jump the answer. For the oldest group we gave them word
searches. This was the first time for
the teacher and for the students.
I strongly believe
that people in poverty need education and people to mentor them. Nelson Mandela who celebrates 95 years of life
is quoted as saying,
“Education is the
most powerful weapon you can use to change the world.”
I couldn’t agree more.
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