I'm going to make a snowman!

This past week I was able to accompany 30 7th graders from my school on an overnight class trip to Granada, chaperoning along with the Jose-Miguel the phys-ed teacher, Noe the English teacher and Abby, the other language and culture assistant (from Seattle). We started off at 8:30 in the morning, waving goodbye to nervous mothers and relieved teachers (class size reduced by 90% for two days! Glorious!). The kids were hilarious on the bus, singing camp-type songs on the bus, and trying to make Abby and I promise to speak only in Spanish for the whole trip (nothing doing kiddos! I'm here to teach you English!).

We didn't visit the Alhambra (which surprised me at first...but after spending less than 48 hours with these kids, I think it was probably a wise decision to save the Alhambra for a high school trip - so active). Instead, we visited Granada's huge "Parque de las Ciencias" (Science Park - think a combination of a small zoo plus the Hands-On Museum or Cosi museum in Ohio...multiply that by 10).


Science Park Playground from Catherine Steiner on Vimeo.

We also got to take a bus trip up to the Sierra Nevada mountains where the kids went sledding and ice skating. I think for a fair amount of them it was their first time seeing real, live snow, so it was fun to watch their reactions. The first video is of the kids seeing the snow-capped mountains from the bus as we got closer to Granada - (the tour guide was telling them a legend about two lovers one a Muslim princess, the other a Christian man who jumped from some nearby cliffs because they would never be accepted in one another's worlds) - you can hear them get excited as soon as the tour guide mentions "nieve" (pronounced "nee-ay-vay"). The second video is them when they first got off the bus in the Sierra Nevada:


Seeing snow from the bus from Catherine Steiner on Vimeo.


Snow Fight! from Catherine Steiner on Vimeo.

I also didn't realize until the trip how much I actually kind of missed the snow (ok, ok - I realize that all you guys in the Michigan/Midwest area have just been hit with tons of snow lately, and unbelievable cold...but think how much winter would be lacking without the snow, but just the cold! That's kind of what it's been like here...but a little warmer). I had a heyday getting my kids to sled down from a higher place on the hill ("It's more fun! I promise!" I told them), and getting them to try skating backwards (there might have been a little showing off involved there too...ahem). It was also funny to me to see signs for "sled rental" and "ski clothing rental" - something which makes sense for most Andalusians since they don't live in a place that snows very often.