¿Y Entonces...?

This past week I was able to meet with the two counselors at the high school, rather instituto, in Jalapa about me starting work there regularly. Since we are at the end of the month, I was able to only get two days of work there, but come September, I hope to be making an appearance there at least one, possibly up to three, times a week teaching classes on various topics.

INAJAL (Instituto Nacional de Jalapa) has about 2,000 students enrolled: in the morning, the 7th-9th graders (1st thru 3rd year students) are in class and in the afternoon is the 10th and 11th graders (4th and 5th year students). They go to school Monday thru Friday and their classes are 40 minutes long with a half hour break in the middle of the morning/afternoon.

I started with three sections of 10th graders my first day and three sections of 8th graders on the second.

On the first day, I had two sessions that lasted 80 minutes and one that lasted 40 minutes. To the two longer classes, I gave a charla about the male/female reproductive systems, sexual/reproductive rights, menstrual cycle and introducing fecundation. After that, we transitioned into a Nicaraguan-made 20-minute movie called La Casa de Muñecas about real Nica adolescent mothers and their hardships. From there, I gave numbers about adolescent pregnancy in Nicaragua as well as physical, emotional and economic consequences that it may bring. Lest to say, it's very eye-opening and I think that the all of the chavalos would rather go to University next year rather than having a baby.


The next day, I had three 40-minute sections of 8th graders and did my self-esteem charla. The counselors had warned me that the younger classes are very disrespectful and I'd have to talk over them to get their attention; I told them not to worry since I could project my voice pretty loud. Luckily, all three classes were respectful and were attentive the whole time. At the end of the charla, I gave them an activity in which they had to write one positive thing about themselves (i.e. I like that my friends can confide in me) and one negative thing that they wish they could change (i.e. I don't like that I'm shy). They would take the negative phrase and throw it into the middle of the room and we took all that negativity and threw it away in the trash.