- Team Building and Exercise at NSD
- Immigration in Education: Experiencing the American classroom at all ages
- An unBELIZEable experience
During J-Term, 20 HC students traveled to Belize to deal with these problems on a daily basis. They experienced the life and culture as a resident of Corozal, Belize, and worked within the local schools.
Vicki Valentine and Dr. Judy Hall, assistant professors of teacher education, researched and planned the trip to give education majors an opportunity to teach in a diversified culture.
"To help all children learn, future teachers need to work on developing cultural competence," Valentine said. "Classrooms in Nebraska are changing."
These students, ranging from sophomores to grad-students, spent two weeks in the classrooms of six different schools. They observed and shadowed teachers and some students got the opportunity to teach solo.
"I did not expect that our students would be used as substitute teachers when classroom teachers were absent," Valentine said. "While this was a challenging and sometimes frustrating situation, the HC students were amazing."
Sara Schnase faced her elementary students alone on a day her teacher was absent.
"My favorite moment was when I ended up teaching an entire day by myself," she said.
Schnase knew that Belize could offer her an amazing experience and wanted to become a more culturally diverse teacher.
Becca Smith also wanted to experience teaching in a different culture. Smith spent the two weeks helping two preschool classes.
While Smith taught her preschoolers their ABCs, they taught her how to adapt her style of teaching to another culture.
"I learned that there is no 'right way' of doing things. There are many different techniques that teachers can use to teach children," she said.
Schnase and Smith believe the trip was a success. The trip taught them new techniques in the classroom and how to adapt to another community and its culture.
Kelsea Jones taught at the community college and stayed an additional three weeks in Corozal. Four other HC students are staying for half of the semester to complete their student teaching requirements.
"The students are very respectful, shy and sometimes self-conscious," Jones said. "It makes me think about my attitudes as an American and our loud culture and outgoing personalities."
During the rest of her extended stay, Jones worked to fit into the culture. She said she felt more like a local when the rest of the group of students went back to Hastings.
While in Corozal, HC brought boxes containing books, art supplies and balls to their classrooms. They handed out the items as part of the Books and Balls for Belize program that HC participated in.
Each class received crayons, picture books, coloring books, scissors, rulers and other supplies. Every recess, students ran to be the first one to chose a new ball from the pile donated by HC.
"This trip was incredible," Schnase said.
Due to the positive feedback from many HC students, as well as the schools in Belize, Valentine and Hall are planning the same trip for next J-Term.
"The Education Department at HC is eager to offer new culture and travel opportunities to future teachers," Valentine said.
