A Day in the 8th Grade

Today was our day with the 8th graders at the Instituto La Esperanza. Like we did yesterday with the 7th graders, we provided supplies for making a water powered boat and timed them in the pila. Once their times were recorded, we took them back to the computer lab, instructing them on how to enter data and solve problems and formulas using Excel. Again, like the group the day before, we also taught the students about solar panels and used Excel to figure out the logistics of using solar panels for their school. All of this went incredibly smoothly without any hiccups.

After finishing our time with both groups of 8th graders, we headed back to the ranch for lunch before prepping to head out again. We used this afternoon to survey and inspect the bridge that was built by a previous Lipscomb University engineering team. This bridge has been a huge help for the students and eases the minds of parents because it now connects the elementary and middle schools safely; whereas before, the children were having to walk across a busy road. Once we finished collecting the data about the bridge, which I might add is still in great shape, we went to the back of the middle school to test out our exciting experiment for the 9th graders tomorrow (which will be heavily documented and discussed in tomorrow’s blog).

Finally, we returned back to the ranch where we took it easy after being in the hot, hot sun all day until dinner. As mentioned in a previous blog post, we have been sharing facilities with a group of veterinarian students from Texas. Dinner has been a fun time getting to know these other students better and share about our days. Our team stayed after dinner to help with designing some projects for a local and help fix a computer. Now, we have just finished thoroughly walking through our big day tomorrow.

I feel so blessed to be able to be here in Honduras and the experiences each of us have gained are improving us as students, friends, and leaders and challenging us to grow.