Here is our booklist:
As usual, Jan Brett's books have amazing illustrations, and The Umbrella followed suit. We also really enjoyed Abuela's Weave and The Little Painter of Sabana Grande, because of beautiful illustrations and glimpses into rural Central American life. Juanito loved The Gold Coin and although it's a bit longer for young kids, it is such a great story. Rosie really liked New Shoes for Silvia, I think because she could identify with Silvia! And we colored some girls in traditional dress, you can find Ana of Costa Rica and Maya of Guatemala via the links.
Since we write to four Compassion children in Central America, we spent some time praying for them!
We watched some Compassion videos, and these were our favorites:
We also watched some of the North America, since it showed some of Costa Rica. And the fun thing was that our science topic, sea turtles, coincided well with Central America since many sea turtles lay their eggs in this part of the world! The kids had fun making sea turtles thanks to the prep of a fellow mom in co-op:
We did our sea turtle narration in English and our book narrations in Spanish this week. Here are Rosie's:
We can help sea turtles:
We can pick up the trash
We can not put balloons outside
We can tell people
Turn off the lights
Obey the signs that protect the sea turtles
Tía Rosita envía zapatos rojos a Silvia. Silvia le gusta sus zapatos. Los zapatos were tan grandes. Los bebés de oliva se duermen en los zapatos. Estaban montando en los zapatos porque Silvia estaba fingiendo que zapatos son un tren. Al fin, Silvia crece y puede lleva los zapatos.
- New Shoes for Silvia
And Juanito's:
The leatherback is the biggest reptile in the world. Throw your trash away because it can kill and even hurt sea turtles. Turn your lights off so the sea turtles don't come towards them. The eggs hatch and then they drag themselves to the beach so they can swim in the water. Sea turtles eat jellyfish, clams and plants.
Juan era un ladrón. Juan ve una mujer con una moneda. Y después ella dice, "Soy la mujer más rica del mundo." Y después el hombre Juan la sigue a todos lugares que la mujer va. Pero estaba cosas para hacer. La mujer estaba ayudando los enfermos y dando una moneda de oro. Al fin, Juan vi la mujer parando al frente de su casa, la mujer pide si necesita una moneda. Juan toma la moneda y la niña estaba parando atrás de la mujer y ella digo, "¡Rápido! Mi mamá está solo y el bebé está hace en una momento." Juan da la moneda a la mujer, "El bebé va a necesitarlo más que mí," dice Juan.
- The Gold Coin
We made a few Central American meals, including Costa Rican enchiladas, Nicaraguan egg soup, and of course, rice and black beans, thanks to my favorite cookbook: Extending the Table: A World Community Cookbook by Joetta Handrich Schlabach. Unfortunately, I forgot to take photos... And we made Guatemalan plantains and El Salvadorian cheese muffins for co-op!
In co-op, we prayed for the Q’anjob’al people group in Guatemala and read about them in the Wycliffe book Around the World with Kate and Mack. To go along with learning about the cloud forests, we used markers to color toucans, butterflies and quetzals on photo paper, which gives such a fun, shiny effect.
In addition to sponsoring kids via Compassion, we also sponsor a number of Honduran kids with Manna 4 Lempira, so we watched some videos about the Manna program:
And then we made Easter cards for the Manna 4 Lempira unsponsored children! My kids also made cards for their friends in Honduras, but I wanted to include all of the co-op in the letter writing.
Next up, we are heading to Europe!
Here are the previous countries in the series:
About Hannah Hinojosa...Hannah is a long time Compassion sponsor and writes about her sponsorship journey at Because of Shamim. In addition to being a wife and mother, she is a part-time math professor and loves to read.
