I cannot believe we are at the halfway point!!!! It makes me so sad and it also shocks me! The time I have had here has been priceless, eye opening and life changing! I have spent the past week and a half taking a look at the Costa Rican culture and myself! I really am planning on making a permanent residence here. One of my favorite things that we have done since the last time I blogged was going to Sainta Elena school. We got to observe for the first 40 minutes. Then we went and taught. I am so lucky to have observed a special needs class. The school has 3 types of classes for special needs. One class is for the conduct behavior (like our B/ED classes), another class for "mentally retarded" (I don't like the term), and also a severe handicapped class. Unfortunately the conduct behavior class wasn't meeting until after we were done observing, so I decided to go to the second class. There was only 1 student in the class at the time (Naizeth). She has severe autism, and is about 7 or 8 years old. She has no language development and she is extremely tactile. The teacher sat her in a chair and sat in front of her. She began the lesson by walking her through the routine of the day. She had pictures and sang to her throughout the routine. It was good to see the social skills lesson similar to social skills lessons in the United States. I enjoyed this observation completely. I saw many things in the classroom that were similar to the posters and activities in the United States classrooms. I have seen so much and done so much but am not ready to leave. There are so many things I want to learn. I've met people and talked to them and have gotten a great insight on the people here and don't want to leave in 11 days! We went to El Trapiche this morning and saw the process of making coffee from the very beginning. I have learned more about coffee here (since it is one of their main exports) than I ever expected to. We also got to make candy. We made 4 types, sugar with coffee, sugar with cocoa and peanuts, sugar with coconut and sugar with mint. All of it tasted so amazing! The spanish lessons are helping so much with my communication with Tico family!!! I have learned more about my family and their likes and dislikes and am so glad I get to stay with them for 2 weeks! I will begin to do research on what it takes to make the transition from the United States to Costa Rica in the next coming years. I would love to be here and take the techniques I learn at UNCW and teach Special Needs here in Costa Rica.