Fundación Aprender Nicaragua Biblioteca Los 3 Ernestos

Fundación Aprender Nicaragua
Biblioteca Los 3 Ernestos
Newsletter– Third Quarter, 2013
Founders: Gabriela Prado and James Womack
Librarians: Gretel Prudente and Teresa Moraga
Fundación Aprender is a non-profit organization committed to providing educational opportunities for the youth of Las Salinas de Nahualapa, Nicaragua. We offer daily tutoring classes, art and yoga workshops, game days, fun and
creative activities and sport clinics.
All that we offer is free and open to everyone. We continue to work with our full focus at
the Biblioteca Los Tres Ernestos tutoring boys and
girls in order to help them throughout the school
year. During the school break we offered Math
Tutoring Classes thanks to our ex librarian and
Math professor Mayra Martinez. In 2013
we are sponsoring
91 students !
Take a look
at what we have
been up to during
July, August and
September 2013 !
Gracias SFS Missions, Pierre and Odile Kory for your
monthly donations that are crucial to keep up with all
our programs running and
our Biblioteca Los Tres Ernestos open every day !
GRACIAS to all of you who keep supporting us !
www.aprendernicaragua.org
English Classes for everybody!
English Classes are an on going
program at Biblioteca Los Tres Ernestos, thanks to our volunteers . Our
teachers during the last 3 months
have been Rachel Padilla, a Nicaraguan residing in Florida and Johanna Westen from Germany, who
came to volunteer with us through
Mosaic Project organization.
Artistic Creation for Kids
Teresa Ballester Moreno y Gabriela Pastor, two teachers
from the Estudio de Madrid College from Spain, came to
visit to share a full month trough their “Taller de Creación
Artística para Niños y Niñas” they worked with the school
teacher of third grade Andrea Mena and fifth grade Teresa Chavez, meeting daily with the students and proposing new creative ways to express . Please check our
Facebook page for the full art gallery !
We also received the visit of Kristin Sardina and
Alexis Lovett from San Francisco who came to
share a morning full of fun and art with the kindergarten children, the kids and the teachers
had lots of fun painting and singing traditional
songs in English and Spanish !
Tennis !
Jewelry Workshops
Skylar, Chad and Laura Cheney
Starkey from SFS Missions came
to visit us bringing lots of beads
with them. They taught the children how to create simple and
colorful bracelets and necklaces. Boys and Girls had lots of fun
and came back home with new
jewelry made by them to share
with their whole family!
Johanna Westen continued to teach the Hand Made
Jewelry Workshop that met three
times a week . The class lasted 3
months and the students
learned how to make earrings
and necklaces with feathers,
shells and beads.
Marimba Classes
A new marimba freshly made in Masaya arrived at the
local School donated by our friends Mary and Gregory
Donohoe. They came to visit us for the second time, to
follow up with their marimba classes they started at their
last visit in November 2012. Marimba classes are taught
twice a week at the school with the local teacher Jose
Leon Romero from Masaya.
Yoga Classes
The children in Salinas continued to practice Yoga daily at the Art
Room and at the Popoyo beach with our volunteer yoga teacher
from Yogi-nomad School, Johanna Westen. As we are writing this
edition of our Newsletter Johanna is flying back home (Germany).
We will miss her greatly, she has been an amazing volunteer for
three months, living with a Nicaraguan host family and sharing her
talents and great energy with all of us here in Las Salinas de Nahualapa community. Come back soon Johanna Westen !
Volleyball
Katie Tribley is an “old” friend of Aprender. This year she
visited us with the University of Idaho students. She was in
charge of organizing the Women’s Volleyball team along
with Kim Packer, Erika McGee and Ellie Nagel. 18 Nicaraguan women learned how to play Volleyball and gather
twice a week to practice. Thanks Rob Spear , Pete Showler
and University of Idaho for the ten volley balls donated, the
Volleyball net, pump and needles !
Building Vegetable Gardens
Organizació
As part of their trip “Study Abroad in Global Health
and Community Development in Nicaragua
Course”, Professor Helen Brown from University of
Idaho and her students: Mary Ortman, Ellen Nagel,
Thomas Anderson, Joey Florence, Katie Tribley,
Kimberly Packer, Jennifer Deffenbaugh, Erica
McGee were part of our Vegetable Garden project
by building 3 organic vegetable gardens!
The group dug holes for the posts, set up the fences to
protect the gardens from the wandering pigs, chickens
and cows. They planted papayas, "cuadrado" plantains and a nutritious local plant called "quelite" .
Building these vegetable gardens give the families a
new opportunity to grow their food at home and without pesticides.
Swimming
Swimming classes are taught at the local Hot
Springs pool. Our focus now are the kindergarten students taking classes twice a week !
This last three months we had different teachers from our visiting groups SOS Canada and
University of Idaho students.
Sewing Classes
Jesennia Chavez continues to offer classes twice a week in the
Library’s Art Room. The students are acquiring a skill that can be
transformed into a new income for their families. They have
learned how to make clothing patches, pillows, aprons, skirts and
bags! . Gracias Cheryl Gardner and Helen Brown from Idaho for
your amazing donation of a new electric sewing machine, sewing
supplies and materials... !
Thanks Chad and Laura Starkey and SFS Missions for your
continuing support of the Sewing Program!
Building the Reading Room and the Computer Lab
A new Chapter of Students Offering
Support (SOS) from Canada arrived on August 19th to help us building our new ComOrganizació
puter-Internet Lab and the Reading Room
at Biblioteca Los Tres Ernestos. Thanks to the
financial support of SOS Canada, Miles
Walsh and The San Diego Surf Ladies: Julie
Torgerson, Janice Daniels, Kathy Wahl,
Nancy Brescia, Annie Wu, Kim Holinger, the
help of the Town Council of Las Salinas, the
guidance of Fermin Alcocer and the
amazing energy of many local and foreigner volunteers we have completed this
new project that will make a lasting impact
in the life of our community.
Gracias Andreanne Leblanc, Oana Blandea, Mayuren Ahilan, Aamna Contractor, Meetali Anand, Alisha
Hudani, Michelle Verge, Min Ji Jang, Mingyuan Li, Gagandeep Dhatt, Lauren Wooster, Paul Piotrowski and
Chew Lua for coming to Las Salinas to share and work with us for 2 weeks making the dream come true!
Thank you all for your great donation of school and sports supplies, shoes and clothing !!
We are looking now for LAPTOPS donations.
Any laptop (not too old) good enough to connect to the internet will be welcomed!
Gracias ! Thank You !
As part of the “Community Health and Development in Nicaragua
Course” from University of Idaho, Prof. Helen Brown, leader of the trip,
and the In-Country Coordinator UI alumni, Katherine Tribley organized
the visiting Idaho students in order to volunteer daily at the Local
Health Post. They also brought a generous donation of blood pressure
monitors, medicines, medical stethoscopes, glucometers, test strips for
glucometers, and a fumigation pump. Gracias also University of Idaho, Prof Helen Brown, Pete Showler, Debra Buchahan, Rob Spear,
Mary Ortman, Ellen Nagel, Thomas Anderson, Joey Florence, Katie
Tribley, Kimberly Packer, Jennifer Deffenbaugh, Erica McGee for your
donations of volleyballs, soccer balls, shirts, books and school supplies!
Gracias !!!!!
Organizació
Gracias !! Malia
Alfonso and Lauren
Baumgardner,
guests of Buena
Onda Resort, for
your donation of
school supplies !!
Skylar, Chad and Laura Cheney Starkey for
your shoes and backpacks donation! Thanks to
all the people who supports SFS Missions for the
generosity and efforts to help our community!!
Gracias Johanna
Westen for your donation of clothing, shoes
and school supplies!
Gracias Johanna for
your dedication and
for volunteering for 3
months of you time!
Gracias Jeff Crelling guest of Soma Resort for your donation of school supplies! Thanks Casey and
Bill Morton for your support! Gracias: Karinda Love, Nealie Glasser,
Gloria Glasser, Ruth Savinda, Ginger Loverde, Spanish Immersion
Camps, Inc; Alex and Mitchel Loverde, Barbara Violenna, Jeffries
Quintero from Esteli, Brook McDonald,
Savanna Jones, Gonzalo Martinez
Granados, and Gerardo Villavicencio
for visiting us and for bringing a donation of books, dictionaries, clothes,
ping pong equipment, school and art
supplies and softball gear!
Sports News
Supporting the local sports teams is one of Aprender’s
goals as organized sports are a huge opportunity for
not just physical, but also social development. This includes learning about discipline, teamwork, respect,
sportsmanship, the importance of determination, intensive training and working for your goals. These are
great values to learn and while they carry over to other aspects of life, sports do a great job of teaching
them.
If you would like to help The Women Softball
team of Las Salinas and the Youth Soccer Team of Las
Salinas, they need new softball gear, soccer balls #5
and cleats # 9,10 & 11. Send us a message or make a
donation trough our website!
Organizació
During the last three months we received
sports gear and supplies donations for our Library
team and for the local teams from SFS Missions, Mike
Osborn, University of Idaho, Helen Brown, Pete Showler, Karinda Love, Debra Buchahan and Rob Spear.
We hope you enjoyed this third quarterly update.
For those of you who support Aprender on an on-going basis, your efforts are having positive, long
-lasting effects. We see it daily: kids learning new things, feeding their curiosity, experimenting,
gaining confidence, growing, and developing new skills –both social and academic. Thank You !
For those who are just now learning about what Aprender does, we invite you to visit our website
AprenderNicaragua.org to learn more.
Would you like to help us...? There are many ways:
Share this Newsletter with your friends! Like us on Facebook “Fundacion Aprender Nicaragua”!
Come to volunteer! Send school and sports supplies or clothing with a friend or come yourself
with the perfect excuse to visit Nicaragua!
To make a donation to help us continue volunteering our time in order to serve our community
click here http://aprendernicaragua.org/help.html
Junta Directiva de la Fundación Aprender Nicaragua (FUNAPRE)
Presidente: James Womack — Vicepresidente: David Orlando Lara Bustamante
Secretaria: Maria Teresa Moraga Duarte —Tesorera: Martha Rosa Sacasa Barrios
Vocal: Uranea Chavez Obando — Fiscal: Maria Filomena Ruiz Collado.