Mission trip 2022 reflections

 It's been a long time since I've been on a mission trip.  My first was when I think I was in 8th grade.  Our church youth group went to New Orleans.  I remember it was the first time I had seen people who were really in need. It softened me.

I went on a mission trip during spring break during my junior year at Baylor.  We went to Boston and painted a church.  I remember cleaning the floor after my teammates painted and left paint on the floor.  I also remember having fun with friends.

I've been praying for an opportunity to use my Spanish skills on a mission trip for years--over 20 years.  I finally was brave enough to go on one.

A saying on our Dare Greatly daily calendar:  "Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony." --Mahatma Gandhi

We went to Costa Rica.  There were 14 of us from our church.  It was fantastic.  My twin sons went.  I was nervous about that because they were some of the youngest, but it was truly a joy to watch them do hard things. 

I'm learning that doing hard things is what really brings the most enjoyment from life.  I love teaching, but using my Spanish skills to help others communicate is really fantastic.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Discussing AI usage with students

Today in class we wrapped up Ch 1.  Ch 1 Quiz is later this week. I have found that many students have test anxiety.  I have weekly announcements I send out to my beginning classes that give study tips.  Hopefully this helps them feel more prepared as we go into quizzes and tests.  This point of the class is a natural time to discuss ethical usage of AI. Today we discussed ethical usage of AI with Spanish.  It was a great discussion.   A student pointed out it's helpful to use AI to make practice material to study.  This was new for me. I give them a chapter 1 summary that has everything on it.  In my mind, use that to study the material.  Make flash cards.  Practice them. I'm unsure how an AI can improve upon that, but if a student has found a way to learn the material, fantastic.
Read more

Amazing OER materials

As I'm building my Spanish conversation class, I'm thrilled that our librarian helped me find an amazing resource.  It's videos of Native-Spanish speakers telling about specific topics:  numbers, food, colors, etc.  The videos are very short and easy for beginning students to understand. They also already have CC in English and Spanish.  This resource is fantastic.   Hooray for wonderful OER resources!
Read more

Changing is rough

This semester I'm allowing my face to face class to take their quizzes and tests in person.  I have so many online sections that it's easier on my end for all my classes to use the online proctor when they take quizzes and tests.  Added to that, former students in my face to face sections told me they preferred taking the quizzes and tests online because they could take them at home, it was easier to focus, etc. My own son is in a dual credit class that requires online proctoring this semester.  It's going fine now, but getting it set up was a headache.  I wanted to offer the option to my face to face students to avoid the online proctoring.  We discussed it as a class and they agreed that they preferred to take the quizzes and tests face to face. Here's what I'm finding:  grades are about the same.  Students seem more nervous on our class review day because they know a quiz or test is coming at the end of class.  If they miss class they have to m...
Read more