Panamanian Birthday

Today I was lucky enough to turn 20 right here in Calobre, Panama. The other teachers at the school were kind enough to throw me a surprise birthday party at the end of the day, and my host family has other celebrations planned for me this weekend, which I am looking forward to. The best reward of all though was that today, for the first time in my five weeks here, I was pleasently surprised by the progress one of my classes is exhibiting. Not only did most of the students do well on a quiz based on material I have been teaching them for the past couple of weeks, but they have finally began to learn good classroom behavior. When I first arrived, students were accustomed to talking, copying, and running around during quizzes and tests. Today during the quiz, the kids stayed in their seats, actually raised their hand if they had a question, and did not copy each other. Seeing this kind of progress has been the best birthday present of all; its great to know that I’m actually having an impact!