Last Chance for a Luxurious Weekend at Manuel Antonio!

As a follow up to our friend Heidi Romanish's fundraising efforts on behalf of JumpStart Rincón Grande, there's a fantastic raffle for a weekend for two at the Hotel Parador, Manuel Antonio, for each donation of 10,000 ($20) to benefit the our ongoing JumpStart educational programming in Rincón Grande de Pavas. The raffle will take place June 29th and numbers 34-100 are available. To participate, donate online, via check or bank deposit (information including bank accounts below), and send us a private message to confirm. Please note in your message three raffle numbers of your preference, or whether you'd rather we choose a lucky number for you. Thanks for helping our students in Pavas!

Como recuerdan, nuestra amiga Heidi Romanish ha estado realizando esfuerzos para recaudar fondos y fortalecer los campamentos JumpStart en Rincón Grande de Pavas. Hay una magnífica rifa para un fin de semana de lujo para dos personas en el Hotel Parador, Manuel Antonio, para beneficiar al programa. La rifa será el 29 de junio y tenemos los números 34-100 disponibles, por cada donación de 10,000 colones. Si le gustaría aportar a una buena causa puede donar en línea o por cheque (vea enlace abajo) o a las cuentas que se detallan abajo y enviarnos un mensaje privado con el detalle. Favor indicar en su mensaje tres números de su preferencia en caso de que se hayan vendido, o si prefiere que le asignemos una a la suerte.

TO DONATE, VISIT US HERE /  VISITENOS AQUI PARA DONAR HOY... 

BANK ACCOUNTS/CUENTAS: Banco Nacional de Costa Rica. Dólares: 100-02-171-401-8, SINPE 15117110020004017. Colones: 100-01-171-385-7, SINPE 15117110010003850. Cédula jurídica de la Fundación: 3-006-555591. 

Benefit Festival for Rincón Grande de Pavas Education

Para español, por favor baje al final del post.

The Costa Rica Multilingüe Foundation and JumpStart Costa Rica are thrilled to announce that educator and longtime program collaborator Heidi Romanish, founder of Friends through English at the Blue Valley School, is organizing a festival to benefit ongoing educational programming in Rincón Grande, an impoverished community in western San José. Funds raised at the event (or online, by check or bank transfer) will allow Costa Rica Multilingüe to support participants in Friends through English, which unites Blue Valley and Rincón Grande in the study of English, and JumpStart Amazon - Rincón Grande de Pavas, an intensive English camp. The event will be held Saturday, June 7th, from 12-5 pm, at the Polideportivo de Aranjuez (directions below), and will include acoustic music by various artists, a yoga demonstration, a poetry reading and food from the Feria Verde. Admission is free with a recommended minimum donation of 5,000 colones. Donors at the level of 10,000 colones or above will receive a volume of original poetry and be entered in a raffle for prizes including a weekend at the Hotel Parador in Manuel Antonio.

Donations can be made at the event or before, during and after the festival by check, bank transfer or online donation. Visit us here to make your donation today!

Directions to the event: The Feria Verde, a weekly organic farmer's market, is located at the Polideportivo Aranjuez, 300 m north and 300 m west of the Santa Teresita Church in Barrio Escalante.

Visit the event on Facebook or write to organizer Heidi Romanish or CRML Academic Director Katherine Stanley for more information. Visit our webpages for details on Friends through English and JumpStart Costa Rica.

ESPAÑOL: Para JumpStart Costa Rica y la Fundación Costa Rica Multilingüe es un placer anunciar que una colaboradora cercana nuestra, la educadora Heidi Romanish, quien fundó "Amigos por el Inglés" en el Colegio Blue Valley, está organizando un festival para apoyar a nuestros programas educativos en Rincón Grande, una comunidad urbano-marginal en San José. Las donaciones realizadas en el marco del evento (en el Festival o en línea, por transferencia o cheque) permitirá a Costa Rica Multilingüe apoyar a participantes en Amigos por el Inglés, que une a estudiantes de Rincón Grande y del Blue Valley por medio del estudio del inglés, y JumpStart Amazon - Rincón Grande de Pavas, un campamento intensivo de inglés. El evento se llevará a cabo el sábado 7 de junio de 12 md-5 pm, en el Polideportivo Aranjuez (direcciones abajo), e incluirá música acústica de varios artistas, una demonstración de yoga, poesía y comida de la Feria Verde. La admisión es gratuita, con una donación mínima recomendada de 5,000 colones. Donantes en el monto de 10,000 o más recibirán un libro de poesía original y un número para una rifa de premios incluyendo un fin de semana en el Hotel Parador en Manuel Antonio.

Las donaciones se pueden realizar en el festival o antes, durante o después del evento por cheque, transferencia bancaria o en línea. Visítenos aquí para realizar su donación hoy!

Direcciones al evento: La Feria Verde, una feria orgánica semanal, se lleva a cabo en el Polideportivo Aranjuez, 300 m norte y 300 m oeste de la Iglesia Santa Teresita en Barrio Escalante.

Visite el evento en Facebook o escriba a organizadora Heidi Romanish o la Directora Académica de CRML, Katherine Stanley, para mayor información. Visite nuestros sitio web para más información sobre Amigos por el Inglés/Friends through English o JumpStart Costa Rica.

English isn't embarrassing, it's fun!

The second and third weeks of camp, the students had a lot more fun and were a lot less embarrassed speaking English. 

This week we learned about the body and the face. Students proudly showed off their drawing!

 




























They students had a race to label the body parts.

Justin came to visit Jump Start and helped us paint masks to express our new emotion words!

We also had a visit from Fiorella, who gave us some acting tips! The students created skits to demonstrate personality traits.

  

Some very brave students volunteered to be models in our fashion show! Sheila brought in funny hats and wigs and the students made silly outfits out of our clothing. On day two students brought in there own clothing and took over and it was quite a show! Some of our shyest students turned out to be our star performers on the runway!

On Friday we played a game to demonstrate a lesson on team work. Who knew it would be so hard to throw two balls around a circle in a pattern!? 

Justin Fell and Sheila helped campers design posters based on the themes we learned from the ball toss game (above). Themes were: sharing, together is better and love and caring.To wrap up the week we had a special visit from Jose of Peace Corps.

A well rounded Jumpstart!

Now, for those of you who don't know, Jumpstart is a project that I am executing for the second year in a row here in my site. Its something that I feel very proud of and passionate about. Why?

Well, for a million reasons but mainly...because you can see results.

So often in Peace Corps you are plagued with the omnipresent question of "Am I really making a difference?"

 In TEFL (the teaching English program) its often times difficult to see if your efforts are paying off.

"Are the student's improving their English?"

 "Is my co-teacher learning anything from me?"

And so on. Most of the time you just have to hope for the best and move on.

This is not the case with Jumpstart.

The month long intensive English camp is designed so that students improve their language skills drastically in one month and its really inspiring to see.

I have a student attending my camp who couldn't respond to the question "how are you?" in English, 22 days ago. Today, she explained her daily routine to me in detail....that to me is astonishing.

Now, this year I have been fortunate enough to have the help of several nearby volunteers and have been able to really round-out my camp. So far I've been able to incorporate lessons on bullying, self-esteem, and setting goals and thinking towards the future, in our new "high school readiness" portion. These "extra" lessons (done in Spanish so the students feel comfortable and get to really grasp the concepts) give the students a way to express their hopes and fears about high school while learning valuable skills to be successful during this transition. I think so often students here are not academically or emotionally prepared for the transition into large overwhelming high schools and this new portion of the camp has really allowed us to address that.

This past Friday I had the pleasure of hosting an English teacher from a nearby high school, a university student who is studying law, and another volunteer as a discussion panel for my students. Students who left the first day of camp without uttering a word because they were so shy, were jumping out of their seats asking questions to our guests. "How do I take the entrance exam to your high school?" "What are the requirements to study at your university?"

And when we asked how many students were planning on attending the University every single one raised their hand. Now that is awesome.

I'm even more excited for this upcoming Monday where we will have about 15 student's from the US Embassy's Access Micro-scholarship Program join our class and help us teach the lesson! These students are in 9th and 10th grade and have been chosen to attend the Access program Saturday's during the school year. They generally have a very high level of English, great grades, and are leaders in their high school. They are going to be great role models for our campers!!

I'll post more after our graduation ceremony on Wednesday!

Tracing Axel to talk about Body Parts!

Daniella is great at modeling!

Fiorella modeling!

After our fashion show to learn about clothing!

Last year's Jumpstart Alum come back to talk about high school!

Raising each other's self esteem by writing nice things!

Danica has the students walk in each other's shoes before we talk about bullying!

learning about professions!

Welcome to Jump Start 27 de Abril!

Jump Start! Week One in Review

Jump Start 27 de Abril welcomed 40 students to the colegio last week. In the usual Jump Start fashion, the new 7^th graders arrived a little shy and uncertain about spending the last month of their vacations speaking English all day. I asked if they were excited to start classes in the colegio and… silence. Then I asked “Are you anxious/ nervous about coming to the colegio?” and got a lot of head nods. Luckily, we had a lot of special guests to get them excited. The first day, the resident goat, Giovanni, waltzed right into the classroom to break the ice. His appearance certainly brought a burst of energy!

Giovanni visits our class daily.
Giovanni visita nuestra aula cada día.

The second day of camp we had a much more esteemed visitor, Marta Blanca, the director of Costa Rica Multilingue. She had even the shyest students sticking out there tongues to pronounce “thank-you” and rubbing their bellies                     as a cue to pronounce nammme. 

                For day 3 – ‘Where do you live?’ 

We brought all the students together to play outside. We made a circle of all 40 students and 4 teachers and took turns calling out one of the ten communities where we live. When your community is called you have to run to find a new spot on the circle. The students loved <3 making our MEP co-teachers run! The game also had an unexpected and welcome effect, of motivating our campers. Since we have 40 jump starters at the colegio, they are divided into 2 separate, more manageable groups of 20, receiving all their lessons separately. My group was begging for more English classes, concerned that the other students ‘knew more’! Music to my ears!                                  

The Spanish Hat! El Sombrero de Espaol!

High School students speakers.
Los estudiantes del colegio.

The last two days of the week the students finally started to relax and even if they are just saying a few words of English the embarrassment is fading. The Spanish Hat finally became cool!! Students were initially refusing the hat, but after a few days they were posing with it for photos and asking if they could wear it during recess. We ended the week with games like charades, bingo and races to review our English. We also had some amazing colegio students come to address hopes, worries and questions regarding starting high school. Thanks to our guests, the Jump Start students are much more excited and less nervous for classes to begin. Week one was a big success in building confidence for our Jump Start students!

Charades. Juegos.

Jump Start – La Primera Semana en Repaso

Jump Start 27 de Abril dio la bienvenida a 40 estudiantes en el colegio la semana pasada. En la forma habitual de Jump Start, los nuevos estudiantes del septimo llegaron un poco tímidos y inseguros a pasar el último mes de sus vacaciones hablando Inglés todo el día. Les pregunté a ellos si estaban emocionados para comenzar las clases en el colegio y todos se quedaron en silencio.  Luego les pregunté "¿Están nerviosos por llegar al colegio?" y la mayoría estaban de acuerdo. Por suerte, teníamos una gran cantidad de invitados especiales para ayudarlos a motivarse. El primer día, el cabro residente, Giovanni, ingresó a la aula para romper el hielo. Su entrada, sin duda trajo una explosión de energía!

El segundo día del campamento tuvimos una visita mucho más apreciada, Marta Blanca, la directora de Costa Rica Multilingue. Ella logro que los más tímidos de los estudiantes participaran y hizo que los estudiantes sacaran la lengua para pronunciar "thank-you" y tocando su panza como una señal para pronunciar ‘nammme’. Para el día 3 – el tema era "¿Dónde vives?" Trajimos a todos los estudiantes juntos para jugar al aire libre. Hicimos un círculo los 40 alumnos y 4 profesores y turnamos gritando una de las diez comunidades en las que vivimos. Cuando decían el nombre de su comunidad tenían que correr para encontrar un nuevo lugar en el círculo. A los estudiantes les encantó <3 mandaron a correr a nuestros compañeros  del MEP! El juego también tuvo un efecto inesperado que  motivó a nuestros estudiantes. Tenemos 40 estudiantes en el campamento, los cuales están divididos en 2 grupos separados de 20 cada grupo para hacerlo más manejable. Gracias a este actividad mi grupo me pidió más clases de inglés porque les preocupa que el otro grupo sepa más! Música para mis oídos!

Los dos últimos días de la semana, los estudiantes por fin comenzaron a relajarse y están diciendo algunas pocas palabras en Inglés y la vergüenza está disminuyendo. El Sombrero de español por fin se convirtió en una cosa tuanis! Los estudiantes se negaron inicialmente usar el sombrero, pero después de unos días querían fotos con el sombrero y preguntar si podían usarlo durante el recreo. Terminamos la semana con juegos como adivinanzas, bingo y carreras para repasar nuestro Inglés. Algunos estudiantes escribieron cuales son sus esperanzas y preocupaciones y preguntas acerca de cómo comenzar el colegio. Gracias a nuestros visitantes del colegio, los estudiantes de Jump Start están mucho más emocionados y menos nerviosos para el comienzo de las clases. La primera semana fue un gran éxito porque nosotros pudimos mejorar la confianza de nuestros estudiantes de Jump Start!

JUMPSTART hits Siquirres!

Hello All,

Sorry this update is coming to you a little late but we are now in our second full week of Jumpstart camp!
We have a full camp this year and the students are learning at an alarming rate!
 Our camp started off with a great group of students who were a little bit shy and hesitant to participate. That didn't last long...our students are now bursting with energy and constantly wanting to volunteer for the next activity. They are exceptionally bright and I find myself having to plan 2 or 3 extra activities since we seem to move through the material very quickly. Every once in a while we will play a game that has NOTHING to do with English and that keeps the mood light and fun.  The best part of these first two weeks is seeing the leaders in the group emerge and help other students when they fall behind.
This past Friday we had our first "high school readiness" lesson, where we talk about the transition for these 6th grade students into high school. I had the help of a wonderful youth development volunteer who was able to come in and talk to group about bullying and goal setting. The students were very responsive and vulnerable and I think the experience brought our group closer together. The students took the goal setting lesson very seriously and they were able to set short term goals for themselves, to be accomplished in the next six months. Many of these students have very little resources and opportunities and to see them thinking ten years into their future and setting short and long term goals was inspiring.

More to come soon!

JumpStart 2014 Just Days Away

Just over a week after New Years, CRML will be kicking off our 2014 edition of JumpStart Costa Rica! Like last year, we’ll be providing you with updates not only from our office but also directly from the ground. Check out the top column to the right, “Our 2014 camps,” for links to each of our JumpStart 2014 sites around the country. You’ll find empty pages at the moment, but between January 9th and February 7th, 2014, they’ll fill up with stories, pictures and other media posted by our camp facilitators, with content in both English and Spanish so that all our supporters around the world can stay in the loop and follow the progress of our students.

In the meantime, for a taste of the dynamic classroom experience our students are in for next month, we invite you to peruse postings from the facilitators at the helm of last January’s 2013 edition of camps, also divided by site to the right. Not sure exactly where our JumpStart 2014 sites are located? We’ve got a map for that, which you might find interesting even if you’ve seen it before. Freshly updated, it no longer shows just where our 2014 camps will take place. For each camp, you can now find out how many students will be participating, and also see a list of the schools those students attended this year. In total, nearly 600 students from just under 100 Costa Rican schools will attend JumpStart beginning next month.  

Lastly, if you’d like to become part of the team working to make JumpStart 2014 possible and help plant the seeds for a successful 2015 edition in the future, we invite you to consider making a contribution towards our cause. Support in any amount makes a tangible difference, and pledging yours takes only a few simple clicks of the mouse.

Since it’s perhaps too late to say Happy Holidays, on behalf Costa Rica Multilingüe and the entire JumpStart family, Happy New Year! We look forward to sharing our adventures with you as we roll into 2014.

JumpStart Training Now Underway!

With each edition of JumpStart, the pre-camp training at the end of the school year kicks off the last stretch of project coordination. Today, Costa Rica Multilingüe (CRML) is excited to welcome to San José the Peace Corps Volunteers who will be leading most of our camps this coming January as part of JumpStart 2014! For all involved, this training is exciting on several levels. As the only event that brings together the vast majority of this project’s many collaborators, it’s the one opportunity to really see and grasp firsthand the true scale of JumpStart. Not only does it signify that many months of work are about to pay off; it also indicates to what extent. And it’s safe to say this training will be especially validating.

This week’s training will be twice the size of the one we did this time last year. Whereas JumpStart 2013 included 14 camps led by Peace Corps Volunteers, this January we’ll be doing camps in 26 communities through Peace Corps support. Tomorrow we’ll meet the second half of attendees: most of the 25 MEP (Ministry of Education) English Teachers who’ve signed on to serve as co-facilitators at our Peace Corps camps, as well as those teachers’ Regional Advisors, whose advocacy for this project has proven invaluable at several crucial phases of camp planning. Between Volunteers, Teachers and Advisors, we’ll be working with over 50 counterparts this week. Even those who’ve participated in JumpStart before are in for a treat, because a freshly revised curriculum is coming their way. We’ve added a few new English lessons, as well as entirely new extracurricular components. One, which we’re calling “High School Ready,” includes a series of five sessions to prepare students for their upcoming transition to secondary education more generally. From those five sessions, camp facilitators will chose one to organize and implement with students each week. Sessions include a Q&A with local high schoolers, another with high school teachers on habits for academic success, and a high school tour.


Esteli at Casa Presidencial with
friend Raquel, a Spanish teacher
from the UK who helped teach
the first week of JumpStart camp
in Katsi, Talamanca

This week’s JumpStart extravaganza comes not long after last month’s training with Esteli, a Peace Corps Volunteer who is now halfway through JumpStart 2014’s first and only camp to be held outside the standard January-February timeframe. Esteli is working with students from several schools in Costa Rica’s indigenous Talamanca region, with support from other Peace Corps Volunteers and friends from abroad. So far, her camp has been quite the success. The first day, more sixth graders (rising high schoolers) showed up than the number of students who generally enter the local high school each year. We’re excited to see pictures from Katsi, and will share them here as soon as we get them. Also, expect pictures from this week’s big event, which will be coming soon!

JumpStart 2014: ¡Hora de Inscripción!

Cada uno de los iconos del mapa de arriba corresponde a una comunidad que será sede de un campamento de inglés como parte de la tercera edición de JumpStart Costa Rica programada para enero del próximo año. Por medio de los 23 campamentos indicados (ver la mapa a la izquierda bajo "Donde Estamos" para una version interactiva), JumpStart 2014 tendrá la capacidad de llegar directamente a más de 500 estudiantes, casi el doble del número de graduados de JumpStart 2013. Durante las próximas semanas, nuestra esperanza es poder llegar a muchas zonas más. Esto significa que queda tiempo para que otras comunidades, tal vez la suya, se inscriban para JumpStart 2014. 

Hasta la fecha, voluntarios del Cuerpo de Paz (EE.UU) especializados en la enseñanza del inglés como idioma extranjero (TEFL) han desempeñado un papel clave en la expansión de JumpStart. Con su apoyo, hemos logrado pasar de un sólo campamento piloto a ser ahora una iniciativa nacional. Para el 2014, la alianza entre CRML y el Cuerpo de Paz se ha hecho aún más fuerte: voluntarios de dicha organización están a cargo de coordinar y luego facilitar 22 de los 23 campamentos en el mapa. 

¿Y el otro campamento? ¿Quién estará coordinando y facilitando ese? Para JumpStart 2014, una comunidad no tiene que contar con voluntario/a residente del Cuerpo de Paz para poder montar un JumpStart local. Por primera vez, una comunidad puede solicitar ser parte del programa directamente a la Fundación y recibir para el mes de enero a un voluntario angloparlante reclutado en colaboración con nuestros socios para facilitar su campamento. Este paso significa una apertura del programa JumpStart a cada rincón del país—el acceso para esas localidades donde nuestros amigos del Cuerpo de Paz no están actualmente trabajando, como por ejemplo San Rafael de Alajuela, ¡el lugar donde se está montando ese campamento 23 bajo el liderazgo de una profesora de la zona! 

Para ser aprobado como sede para JumpStart 2014, toda comunidad solicitante tiene que cumplir con dos requisitos: 1) Contar con un residente, sea alguien que hable el inglés o no, que se encargue de coordinar el campamento a nivel local (asegurar el acuerdo formal de escuelas participantes, reclutar estudiantes, etc.) y 2) contribuir con una parte de los recursos y servicios necesarios para JumpStart.

Para mayor información sobre cómo su comunidad puede solicitar un campamento y así formar parte del mapa de sitios para JumpStart 2014, le invitamos a contactarnos al bchildress@crmultilingue.org. Si le interesa apoyar a las comunidades que ya están coordinando campamentos en cubrir todo lo que se necesita para JumpStart (meriendas para estudiantes, materiales didácticos, etc.), haga clic aqui. Hay un límite del número de campamentos que se pueden realizar, así que actué ya. ¡Le esperamos!

JumpStart Expands Beyond Summer Break

Big things are happening in the world of JumpStart! Since this past Monday, the first ever JumpStart camp during students´ mid-year school break (July 1st - 12th) has been underway. The camp, which will last a total of two weeks and include 30 hours of instruction, is being hosted by Reserva Los Coyotes, a nonprofit organization located on a tract of protected forest only a short distance by car from downtown San José. Through its Aula en el Bosque (Classroom in the Forest) program, Reserva Los Coyotes provides elementary students from nearby communities with supplementary instruction in the science topics they learn about in school using hands-on, experiential activities in the outdoors. Like us, they´re committed to dynamic teaching strategies that keep student´s out of their seats and engaged The perfect project partner!



JumpStart Los Coyotes is being facilitated by three volunteers -- Stewart from England, Sima from New York City, and Chelsea from New Jersey – who we managed to recruit through the invaluable support of volunteer organization Maximo Nivel. With assistance from Los Coyotes staff, they´ve spent the last three days reviewing topics such as greetings, basic conversation, and how to describe physical appearance with their 19 students. Starting tomorrow, the curriculum will transition to lessons designed to apply students´ existing English knowledge to topics in science. For instance, instead of describing people, students will be describing animals and leaves. What is the difference between a mammal and an amphibian? What is the difference between a simple leaf and a compound leaf? By the end of this week, our sixth-grade camp participants will be able to answer these questions – in English! At the end of next week, after reviewing prepositions and learning to give directions for navigating the Los Coyotes trails, students will face the camp´s cumulative final project: to devise and complete scavenger hunts involving various landmarks around the Reserve.

JumpStart Reserva Los Coyotes represents substantial progress towards two of our main goals for the JumpStart program: 1) adding more opportunities to reach students, and 2) moving toward a model whereby students learn English in the context of other academic disciplines. As the camp progresses, we´ll be adding more updates to keep our supporters informed, including stories from our volunteer facilitators. Stay tuned!