Paraguay-Peace Corps

I REEEEEEEALLY want to turn my Spanish class into a service project oriented Spanish class.  It is my dream.  I teach Kindergarten to 8th grade.  My students have ME as their teacher for NINE years and I want to impart a bit more on them than just the Spanish language and bits about the different cultures.  I want to be able to teach my students about the real world as best I can and burst their bubbles about how fortunate we are to live where we do.  I want to help them want to help others.

I never like to teach my students about a Spanish-speaking culture unless I have been there to visit and experienced the culture myself or if I have a contact or friend in a specific culture.  But I have taught them about most of the countries that I have visited thus far so I decided that Paraguay might be a good place to start if I want to really help them see how different other people’s lives can be.  So I was just google-ing tonight for a place to start.  A place to find some kid-friendly information about Paraguay.  When I searched, “Spanish Teacher + service project for kids” I found these websites from the Peace Corps.  The first is to have a speaker come to speak at your school about their experience http://www.peacecorps.gov/wws/educators/ and the second is what I value most at this point.  It is a link to Peace Corps Journal entries (that link you to personal blogs) of volunteers living in Paraguay right now.  http://peacecorpsjournals.com/?Journal&journal_id=7309

So I should be in bed now because I get up at 4:45 each day!  But I have been reading these wonderful volunteer’s blogs and commenting on each hoping that someone will respond and want to connect to me and my students via Skype or email so that we can REALLY learn about Paraguay!