Little Schools Close to the Beach in Costa Rica

Ich war in der Familie von Arabella für 3 Monate. Zunächst will ich erstmal die positiven Erfahrungen teilen:
Ich hatte sehr gut das Leben der Leute vor Ort kennengelernt, da Josué der Gastbruder mich vorallem den letzten Monat fast jeden Tag fast überall mitgenommen hat und wir mit seinen Freunden am Strand, feiern oder was Essen waren. Mir hat es sehr gut gefallen Ticos kennenlernen und sehen wie sie sich im Gegensatz zu uns Deutschen verhalten und Leben. Sie kamen mir oft viel freundlicher und “normaler” vor als Deutsche. Teilweise habe ich auch gemerkt, dass ich einfach anders groß geworden bin und mich auch anders verhallte und nicht ganz so offen und “unbesorgt” bin.
Auch Lehrer und vorallem die Kinder in der Schule waren extrem Herzlich!
In der Schule war ich den allergrößten Teil nur in so genannten Campamento was wie eine Ferienbetreuung war. Ich war eigentlich sehr froh darüber, dass es so so war da ich gemerkt habe, dass es mir viel besser gefällt, mit Kindern Fußball zu spielen, als Ihnen etwas über Geschichte beizubringen. Da mich diese Dinge auch mehr interessieren als die anderen.
Die negativen Seiten waren jedoch, dass ich mir teilweise sehr einsam und gelangweilt Programm, da zum Glück für auch eher kurze Zeit ich alleine in der Familie war und ist in dem Dorf, wo ich war, auch kaum Möglichkeiten gab etwas zu unternehmen und ich auch nur mit einem teuren gemieteten Mini Moped aus dem Dorf richtig raus gekommen bin.
Ich bin sehr, sehr froh, das Projekt gemacht zu haben da ich sehr viele schöne Momente, wie zum Beispiel die Lagerfeuer nachts am Strand hatte und viele neue Freunde gemacht habe.

This has been the best trip of my life. This experience was incredible on all levels. First of all the family that hosted me were very kind, very welcoming and very present when I needed help. Secondly, in regards to the school that I helped out in, everyone there was extremely nice to me and made me feel comfortable right away. I was able to meet some very nice people in this school and make some very nice friendships. As far as the children in this school are concerned, they allowed me to grow, to learn about life, and I was happy to realize that I was able to make a small impact on them. I also made incredible connections with them and the goodbyes were very emotional, they even gave me a gift for my departure.
And finally, in my free time all the people I met there were very dedicated to giving me an incredible time doing lots of activities and discovering Costa Rica and their culture with them. Therefore this experience was incredible and exceeded all my expectations, I highly recommend and thank the First Hand Costa Rica organization and all the people I met there for what they made me live.

I worked as a volunteer in a private school. It was a small elementary school where every teacher has his own class with about seven pupils of two different grades for example four pupils of grade 4 and three of grade 5. There was also a kinder garden and a pre-school. In the beginning I helped the teacher in the pre-school by repeating easy English vocabulary with the children like the colors and assist the kids for example with tying their shoelaces and so on. Later I was in the class of grade 4 and 5 where I looked after the children while they were working on their own with their workbooks and tried to answer their questions about their exercises. I also practiced a poem with them. One day they did a spelling competition where I was one of the judges. It always depends on the teacher what work you will do, but you should not expect a good organization in advance. It is more an organization day by day.

While I worked in the school, I lived in a host family. The host family was living next to the beach. I needed to take the bus to get to the school. The bus was really cheap, but I needed to get up early, because the bus drove there at 6 in the morning. Some other teachers also arrived that early in the school, so that we sat there together before the children arrived and ate our breakfast. In the afternoon I took some Spanish classes offered by my host mum, I would recommend you to do it, too. It was perfect to improve my Spanish skills and it is better to have some knowledge of Spanish, because not every teacher there spoke English. The children there have taken me to heart, so it was hard to leave the project in the end.

Thanks to firsthand, with their organization and information it was much easier to travel the first time alone in a foreign country.