A week in the life of the Kinder

Ahh goodness.. it's only Tuesday and this 5:30 wake up call followed by a cold shower is ALREADY starting to get old (4 months is going to be quite some time). Anywho, my school is finally getting back into their regular schedule after my first couple of days being quite hectic.
Here is the "schedule" for my Kinder class:

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday
7:30-8:00 Arrive arrive arrive arrive arrive
8:00-9:00 Class work class work class work class work class work
9:00-9:15 Outdoor game ---------------------------------------------------------------------->
9:15-10:50 Montessori Class ------------------------------------------------------------------>
10:50-11:20 Snack and Recess ------------------------------------------------------------------>
11:20-11:30 Clean up/Wash up ----------------------------------------------------------------->
11:30-12:15 Line Period -------------------------------------------------------------------------->
12:15-12:30 Clean up and GO HOME ---------------------------------------------------------->

In all reality, the only thing that EVER stays the exact same... the arrival of the students and (almost) Montessori Class. For example, on Mondays, the students and Gaby (and of course myself) head over to a gymnastics class from 8:00-9:30 for the students to begin learning gymnastics. Then, from 11:30-12:00 the students have tennis class at the Montessori. This happens to be during line period, which changes from day to day with different types of vocabulary, mathematics, song singing, etc., all in English. Then on Tuesdays, the kids have futbol (soccer) class from 9:00-9:30 and Mandarin (Chinese) lessons from 11:30-12:00. Wednesdays from 8:00-9:00 is always "show and tell" from one of the students in the class, this is all that changes on Wednesdays, so that should be nice! Thursdays from 11:00-11:30 is karate class from the students and finally on Fridays nothing really changes about the schedule except that Gaby tries to do something fun during the line period such as have a cooking class or Friday is also the day for field trips. PHEWWWW, these kids are getting exposed to so much! It is absolutely amazing to me to see 5 year-old children go through such things in just 1 week (and I haven't even seen a full week yet!). I also think it is great because the kids aren't just sitting and learning information that is on standardized tests and constantly have to be worried about that. For those of you who don't know much about Montessori schools to begin with, they learning is based on play. Now, it's not just like running around, going down slides, and swinging on swings type of play, it is education based play. There are certain Montessori materials (just google it and many articles/images come up) and the children are only allowed 1 material at a time. The stations in the Montessori room at this particular kinder are: Botany, Practical Life, Language, Colors, Sensory, and Mathematics. The first day I arrived some of the children were outside washing and drying dishes, while others were inside matching objects with the first letter in their name, i.e. the picture of the apple goes under the "A", and others were lining up certain length of sticks. I have had the opportunity to observe in Montessori schools before so it wasn't at all a surprise for me. I really like Montessori time as well because when the kids are asking me what something is in English, I have them repeat it back to me in English and then tell me the Spanish word. This way I get to learn, too! The days just absolutely fly by here, 1) because they are shorter than days in the United States and 2) because there is a constant change in activity!
Each day is getting easier (besides the cold showers) and I still am not home sick quite yet. I absolutely LOVE skype because it doesn't make me feel as far away from everyone when I can see them at just a click of a button! =)
The food is obviously still delicious, we have ventured out a bit to some local restaurants and our first try was a success! We have been taking pictures of menus and writing down the things that we like so we can remember in case we ever go back or want to order the same thing at a different restaurant. I am SO happy because we can drink the water straight from the tap here and it hasn't made me sick yet. Still just really tired because I'm not quite used to the time change yet (just an hour behind) and waking up at 5:3o is definitely not my thing. It's not bad, though, because my kids have so much energy that it seems to rub right off on me. Although, some of them can be QUITE the handful at times, and I knew it would be like this coming into this situation! I would have to say that the hardest thing about teaching here in Costa Rica is that I can't really discipline because I don't know how to do that in Spanish! Also, listening to a crying kid attempt to tell me what's wrong in Spanish, when this is typically difficult in English because the children are sooo dramatic =) Oh how I just love 5 year-olds! Another challenging thing will be that September is National Costa Rica Month.. so instead of teaching vocabulary like food, or clothes, or means of transportation.. I will have to research and do some studying because all of the topics during the September weeks are about the history of Costa Rica! So I will be learning plenty about this country, which I think will be a good thing, too!
Well, it's off to bed for this girl, my eyeballs hurt =)

Another picture of me by the river we found on Saturday in Orosi! Good night all =)