Carolyn: Concordia Language Villages and Girl Scouts

By Carolyn Kloecker

This past summer, I was very fortunate to have worked at a Spanish Immersion camp in Minnesota called El Lago del Bosque (ELdB). This was one of the greatest experiences I have had in my life, and I have recently used some of the things that I learned there in my work in the community. This past weekend (Saturday Nov. 8th), Campus Girl Scouts held an event called "Dancing Around the World" in which we taught Girl Scout troops from around the area different dances from areas such as Latin America, Asia, and Africa. We also brought in two Registered Student Organizations (RSOs) from the university to teach the girls (ages 6-10) Irish step dancing and Tinikling, a dance from the Philippines.

The dances from around the world that the Girl Scout leaders (including myself) taught came from what I had learned at Concordia Language Villages. My experience teaching dance there and at my previous summer camp helped the Gir Scout event tremendously. I have so much fun working with kids, but I especially enjoy when I am working with them in an active setting, such as swimming, dancing, or playing a sport. The girls really enjoyed learning a lot about different cultures, and they learned some Spanish as well from one of the song we used at the event.
I suggest to anyone who does not yet have plans for the summer, look up Concordia Language Villages and you could work there as a counselor yourself! If you love working with kids, and could speak Spanish all day every day, then it is a really amazing job to have. Not only did my Spanish improve, but I was able to acquire teaching skills and even more experience working with children. Check it out!

Comments

  1. AnonymousNovember 16, 2008 at 8:23 AM

    What a great experience for you, Carolina! Thank you for sharing this with all of the students. I hope that they will look it up and follow in your footsteps!
    Ann

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousJuly 18, 2009 at 6:59 PM

    I am going to El Lago de Bosque in about a month and am very excited! Foreign languages interest me greatly and this is the sort of thing I love to do. I am planning on going to the Japanese camp (also a Concordia language village) next year. Spanish is my school language but I've been learning Mandarin since I was 6 and my brother is teaching me Japanese. I would like to learn even more languages! Anyway I know somebody that works at the French village and she likes it a lot! All of the reviews for the Concordia programs are thumbs up.

    ReplyDelete

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