The Tower at Coaticook

We climbed up a big tower to get a good view. It was 96 feet high, with 120 steps!

Coaticook Gorge Cont...

Coaticook Gorge

Yesterday, we had a field trip to Coaticook Gorge. The weather was beautiful. One of the big things that we did was to go over the suspension bridge. The sign below says that it is the longest pedestrian bridge in the world. It is 169 meters (554 feet) long.

Above: some of our class crossing the bridge.
Below: Caleb and I posing for a picture.

Friday Field Trip

Stephen and I had a field trip on Friday. It happened to coincide with a "planning day" at the kids school. This is not really surprising as they seem to be out of school constantly for some reason or other. (Yesterday was a holiday and today is another planning day-- added to the 3 days of school they had off unexpectedly the week before for asbestos.)
Our field trip was a treasure hunt in downtown Sherbrooke. We split into teams of 3 students (5 teams total), and we each had a different list. We had to find information on various landmarks, stop complete strangers in the street and ask questions in French, and other things like that.
I wasn't sure how the kids would do, because it was a lot of walking and not much of interest to them. But I think they all just enjoyed being out and about on such a nice spring day.
Just in case you were wondering... my team came in first and Stephen's came in second. There were no prizes, but Isabelle thought it was very important that we beat the boys. (I had Isabelle and Caleb and Stephen had Ian with him.)
After we finished, we were waiting in the area in front of city hall for the other teams. The kids had fun running around, and there were many beautiful tulips that we all enjoyed seeing.

An attempt at a family photo. Next time I will have to have all of the kids tilt there heads to opposite sides. Ian is almost hidden.

Sugar Shack

In March, Stephen and I had a field trip to a Sugar Shack. This is the name of a place where they get the maple sap from trees and make maple syrup and other things. In a small "shack" they have maple sap that has been boiled and refined. Some one pours some on snow or ice. You can use a wooden spoon to pick up the hardened syrup and eat it like a popsicle.

Caleb is ready to eat.

This is cold!

After the syrup, we went for a walk in the woods. We got to see the buckets they have attached to the tree to gather the sap. Caleb mostly enjoyed walking in the mud.

More field trip pictures

More from the field trip

This was our very patient guide on our tour. He spoke very slowly and repeated things several times. You can see the confused looks on some of the students faces.

After our tour, we had a chance to play on the playground while we waited for lunch. As you can see, most of the class enjoyed the time!

Our Field Trip

Field trips are not just for kids. Our language school took a trip to an apple orchard. All four of the classes went (2 beginning, 1 intermediate, and one advanced). There are over 30 students total, and some of the people brought their spouses and/or children. We were quite a crowd!
We had a chance to listen to some information about the orchard and the history of apple orchards in Quebec (all in French, of course!) We also went for a tractor ride, had lunch in the cafe, and got to pick apples from the trees.
This trip is part of our "Conversation in Context" grade. We have two more trips throughout the semester. The two teachers from the language school, as well as two volunteers made sure that we all had a chance to speak in French throughout the day. Some of the students in the advanced and intermediate classes can carry on a conversation quite well. Most of the beginners still can't say very much. But I did now how to say, "Tu aimes manger des pommes?" ("Do you like to eat apples?") I made sure I asked that to as many other students as I could so that I could practice the little bit of French that I do know. I still messed up, and half of the time said "Do I like to eat apples?" but people got the general idea.
Today I also learned that you do not say "I am full." in French. I didn't get the exact meaning but it is like saying "I am a pregnant cow." Instead you say "I ate well." At least I was only talking to one of the teachers and one of the other students when I said that!
Ian and Isabelle were in school, but Caleb got to go with us. He was so excited. As soon as he got up he was ready to go on the field trip. He kept saying, "We are going to an apple church today." He really enjoyed the day.