McCanns in Honduras

Above: Lucy enjoying some TCBY at the July 4th party.

(The picture has nothing to do with the post, just a fun picture.)

Amazingly, we have already passed the halfway point of our first full trimester here at the Spanish Language Institute. Though at times it feels like we still don’t know a word of Spanish, when we look at where we were when we started, we see how far we’ve come.

Here is a glimpse at some of the things we’ve studied.

Language Class: Vocabulary of jobs, clothes, animals, weather, seasons, food, transportation, outdoor recreation, the classroom, the house, numbers, the family, and the body parts.

Phonetics Class: Alphabet, inflections, unions, vowels, consonants, combinations, accents, diphthongs, lines, and syllables (all to help our horrible gringo accents).

Grammar Class: Nouns, articles, adjectives, present indicative tense, different “to be” verbs, paraphrases, direct and indirect objects, reflexive verbs, intransitive verbs, preterite perfect (one past tense), preterite imperfect (the other past tense), and the different uses between the two past tenses.

It is amazing that though that list is as long as it is, we still speak Spanish like young children. Learning a language is both humbling and encouraging, and we need both of those things!

Above: A picture of our route to school every day. The blue house on the left is our home, and the green school on the right side is the Instituto de Lengua Espanola. The purple trail is our walk to school, and the purple camera icons are the places were we took some pictures.

Photo 1: One minute into the walk we pass our favorite neighborhood park, Parque Los Sauces. You can see all the grass and trees of the park on the other side of the road.

Photo 2: Two minutes later we come to the longest straightaway of our journey. This road has two little tiendas, a local bus stop, and a menacing street guard we’ve become friendly with.

Photo 3: At the end of the street in the previous photo is this park, La Copa. La Copa has a basketball court we’ve played in some, a few run-down swings for Lucy, and a couple soccer fields. Once we reach La Copa, we’re over half-way there!

Photo 4: 8-10 minutes after we leave home, we’ve arrived here, the back gate of the language school. The big blue building is the gym at the school, and the gate is right in front of it.

Thanks for walking with us, hope you enjoyed seeing a little more of our daily life.

Above: All the books it takes for one beginner Spanish student.

Well we’ve finally started our first full trimester at the Spanish Language Institute in San Jose, Costa Rica. We’ve been here for a while studying Spanish, but that was all child’s play compared to the next four months. Lindsey and I have taken our placement test and been placed in good classes, we both have people on our level or a little higher who will push us to learn even faster. Here is a glimpse of our day at ILE (Instituto de Lengua Espanola):

First Hour: Conversation/Language. In this class we simple talk Spanish, a lot! We talk about ourselves, our family, our life, and anything else the teacher wants to ask us. We even pray in Spanish! Talk, talk, talk, and at 7:30 in the morning no less.

Second Hour: Phonetics. Here is where we take the words we’ve learned and try to say them so that actual Spanish-speakers can understand us. It is amazing the difference between knowing the words you want to say and actually saying them correctly.

Third Hour: Grammar. Nouns. Adjectives. Verbs. Remember those English classes you had as a kid? Like that, but in Spanish.

Fourth Hour: Grammar. More nouns, adjectives, and verbs.

By the end of the day, we are beat. But it is amazing to see what we can learn in just one day, and then to multiply that by 4 months truly is encouraging. We may actually learn Spanish after all!

Above: Lins ready for school.

This picture encapsulates the transitions we’re going through in life right now (look closely and you just may see a pooch). Just last week, Lindsey and Baby Tico (our baby) transitioned from the first trimester to the second. Our first trimester coincided with our first few months here, and it was not easy. New foods and smells did not mix well with Lindsey’s pregnant stomach, but we’re hoping things get better in the second trimester.

Also in the picture is Lindsey’s book bag, the one she will be taking to our first day of school tomorrow. We’ve finished up our intensive courses and tutoring, and now we are starting a four month trimester. We will be in class 4 hours a day, 5 days a week, all in Spanish. We’ll be studying language, pronunciation, and grammar.

We’re excited to see what the Lord has in store for us this next trimester.

Above: This is the white board in Lindsey’s grammar class after a particularly mind-boggling day of studying direct and indirect objects.

We’re half way through our intensive language course and we can already see it paying off in our daily interaction. The first day of class we were tested to see how much Spanish we knew. Lindsey was placed in the 3rd class (out of 5), while Sean ended up in the 1st class (that would be the lowest).

We go to school around 1 pm every day, drop Lucy off in nursery, and begin class at 1:30. We each are in a class with 4 other students on the same level, or at least close to our level. From 1:30 to 2:45 we study grammar (ie: verb congregation, pronouns, direct/indirect objects, etc.) Then after a 10-minute break, we go to our conversation class until 4:10, we were learn new vocabulary and put everything that we have learned into action.

In Lindsey’s conversation class she has had to give oral presentations on the city of Charlotte, a summary of a newspaper article, and a retelling of the parable of the sower. Sean has presented in class what he is wearing, his different body parts, and his family tree.

All in all we have enjoyed our learning experience has it has challenged us, but at the same time truly helped us as we interact with the culture.