First Day of School

Last Wednesday was the boys first day of school in Cuenca.  The pre-basica schools here (which happen to include Kindergarten) start later than all of the other higher level schools, so it was kind of nice that Finn and Elliott were able to start the year with everyone else.  This also made for an extra long summer vacation!?!

 CEDEI, the Center for Interamerican Studies, is a fantastic little school that emphasizes hands on learning  and takes an alternative approach that follows the "multi-intelligence" based learning method developed by American developmental psychologist Howard Gardner.

Nevertheless the school claims that it teaches 50/50 Spanish and English thus not only making this Finn's first day of Kindergarten, but also the first time the boys will be taught in English!  That said, both of the boys teachers speak very little English (I have to speak to them in Spanish!) and in Finn's class of all of the 12 students, he is the only native English speaker.  The music class is conducted in English as well as a once a week swim class that will start at the end of the month.

An added bonus is that they also teach adults Spanish (Yippee) so I will start classes this week as well, although most likely minus the finger paints (boo).

The first day of school included the parents along with a rad magician and it was really fun for all and a great way to introduce kids to school. Finn was one of three kids to be ushered to the front of the stage to be part of one of the silly acts.

Let's play how quickly can you spot the gringo kids?

Shannon XO