KatieZinna

This spring break, 20 juniors and seniors in Spanish III classes and higher were able to attend the Costa Rica trip. The trip cost around $3,000 and was an opportunity for Marian students to immerse themselves in the Spanish language and learn more about Costa Rican culture.

Over the course of seven days, students traveled to Sarchi, a town famous for its colorful ox carts and art, the currently very active Poás Volcano, an animal rescue center and the beautiful Manuel Antonio National Park. Marian girls also participated in a cooking class where they made a traditional Costa Rican dish, patacones.

At the beginning of each day, the girls attended a Spanish class for two hours, where they gained insight into Costa Rican culture and practiced their Spanish. After that, they would head on back to their host families to have lunch and eventually continue on to their planned adventure of the day. Marian girls ended their days by having dinner and spending time with their host families.

For their Spanish classes, the girls were split up into three groups based on their roommates and Spanish speaking level. “Our classrooms there were outside in the shade and the first part of class was going over the small assignment our teacher gave us the night before, which was usually just speaking practice with our host family,” junior Emerson Payne says. “We would also go around asking each other questions and try to keep conversations going.” She continues on to say that her teacher wanted the girls to focus on speaking quickly while still being grammatically correct. 

Staying with a host family was a unique experience these groups of girls got to participate in. Payne says, “staying with a host family was personally my favorite part because after our excursions we got to come home to them. In Costa Rica, people are very family-oriented, so everyone would spend time together.” Senior Heidi Hans remembers being really nervous and awkward around her host family at first. Hans says, “After a couple nights, however, my roommate and I started to gain more confidence and worked up the courage to talk to her and have a nice conversation. She was really sweet and was very patient with our slow Spanish.”

Costa Rica’s main language is Spanish, meaning Marian students had to use their Spanish skills to communicate with their families, tour guides and any other native Costa Ricans they ran into. Hans reflects on how hard of an adjustment it was to travel to a place where you can’t fully understand everyone. “It was a bit challenging at first. It more comes from a place of confidence than skill. You need to acknowledge that you are going to make mistakes and that your Spanish is not super good. Once you work up the courage to not be afraid of making mistakes, it becomes easier to communicate,” Hans says.

Overall, the only problem Payne had with the trip was how fast it went, because she wishes she had more time to spend with her host family and explore the town more. 

While reflecting on the trip, Payne says that she learned much in the span of a couple short days. She came back from Costa Rica with a renewed passion for Spanish. “This trip definitely made me want to continue speaking Spanish,” Payne says. She also describes her love for learning about new cultures and the similarities and differences other countries have with the United States. Payne says, “ We’ve covered and learned about a lot of history and culture in class, but actually getting to live in it for a week and being able to see it for ourselves made it so much better.”