Pictured above: “Recess when you live in Costa Rica”
“Since graduation TEFL in August, I have been working at Mareas International Home School in Samara. I work in a combined classroom of students ages 3-5 as the English teacher. The school houses students from pre-kindergarten through high school and offers a variety of language instruction such as Spanish, English, and French. In my classroom, my co-teacher and I teach using a variety of interactive and hands on strategies, such as songs, finger-play, movement/dance, and practicing our fine and gross motor to enhance learning. All students are educated in a bilingual environment. We review the days of the week, months of the year, the alphabet, colors, and numbers in one language and then again in the other.
When the school year began, most of our students only had the abilities to speak and comprehend Spanish, but I am so proud to report that all of the children are speaking, singing, and counting in English as well as Spanish and seem to really be enjoying learning a new language!”
-Jillian Zarra, August 2014 TEFL graduate