Let the Drama Begin!

We are having guests this weekend – the T2T group from San Salvador is coming to attend the wedding of one of our UNIVO team members, Herberdh Chicas. They’re coming Fri. night – no, Sat. morning – no wait, Friday night – wait maybe... Vol. Karen and I decided to plan a walking tour, if they overnight, for before the 10am wedding that would show them our university site and then take in the huge street market, one of the busy parks, etc. since they’re getting right back in the van after the wedding and continuing to the coast to spend time a one of the beautiful beaches. We found interesting displays at the market and delicious “galletas de crema” 2 for a quota (quarter.) We think our guests will like the tour.

This is catch up day in class. We missed 1 day last week because we started on Tues. and I need to be back on track for presenting live dramas this Friday. The drama series begins with a simple “readers theater” which is just reading a play out loud – no costumes, props or actions. This is a good level for beginning English speakers who need to focus on reading a script. Then we move to puppet presentations of the same story which introduces a safe level of acting for the teachers – they are familiar with the story, which is a pattern story with a lot of repetition of vocabulary words and phrases, but they still have a script in their hands. Now they use more drama than just their voices and trying to read while moving the puppet creates many funny moments.

Then we moved to reading “side-by-side” books which are a bilingual version of American fairy tales. The teachers read in partners English and Spanish text on the same page, alternating to practice their English, but always having the Spanish handy to explain unfamiliar English words. The goal for the rest of the week is to turn their fairy tales into scripted dramas.

Vol. Eric and I played a magic trick on the class called “book magic” – well we tried to trick them. One woman guessed how we were doing it on the 2nd round – they are too smart! Tomorrow is picture day – one of the teachers called our MIA participant to give him a special invitation to be present for the picture – we all hope he returns after a 3-day absence.

We have lost one woman participant whose biopsy came back positive for breast cancer -- stage 4. The class plans to send her a card next week to know we miss her and are thinking about her. How quickly strangers have bonded!