Handmade corn tortillas and smiling students

Several students from ages 8-12, got their first taste of Spanish Immersion/Culture Excursion Camp last week under the direction of Meliza Flores at Slice of Life Enrichment School. Camp Attendees got to help make (and eat) authentic Hispanic Cuisine, such as Jamiaca tea, cucumber mango salad and warm corn tortillas kneaded and grilled in class. They learned about various Spanish speaking countries, colored flags, made their own accurately labeled skeletons and solar systems (in Spanish) and hand-crafted giant flowers in the traditional Mexican style. Together they learned and practiced basic vocabulary relating to introductions, family, colors, numbers and seasons, and worked with Flores to perfect their new Spanish accents with new camp friends.

Flores, a native of Mexico, came to the United States as a child and married her husband, Benjamin Flores, Jr. in 2005. She has three beautiful young daughters who learned from infancy to speak Spanish with Meliza and English with their father. Meliza says that learning Spanish is important because, "in today's society, being a part of our diverse community, Spanish is a great tool to bring that diversity together and build a stronger future. It is the key to exploring the many parts of our larger world that speak Spanish."

Several years ago Meliza began to share her Mexican heritage and Spanish language skills with other families within her homeschool group who recognized the immense value and practicality of what she was offering. Meliza has since been enriching the education of children and families in a fun, low-pressure, no-grades, hands-on, family-friendly style that makes learning Spanish really enjoyable and much more successful long-term.

Because we believe in this very successful model, Slice of Life Enrichment School is very pleased to have retained Meliza to help bring her teaching style to the larger Tehachapi community. As an integral part of this endeavor, Slice of Life parents have the option of learning to speak Spanish for free with their children and even receive a substantial discount for their children for attending with them. This makes our program more successful because it enables families to learn together, practice at home and really make learning Spanish an integral part of daily life – not just a classroom experience. If you think you might enjoy and benefit from learning Spanish as a family or in having your older children learn independently, consider Session II of Spanish Camp offered in July, or our regular Spanish classes taught four times per week during the school year (twice per week during summer).

Other fun, educational, enriching camps offered at Slice of Life this summer, are our Fine Arts Beginning Drawing Crash Course for ages 9-adult, Little Sprouts Art Camp for ages 5-9, French Immersion/Culture Excursion Camp for ages 8-16 and Creative Writing/Drama Camp for ages 9-16. To ensure the quality of our offerings and the optimal learning experience for our campers, session sizes are deliberately kept small (no more than 20 students per session) – so register soon! For more information, please visit http://www.Sliceoflifeschools.com, or call/text (661) 733-7409 to register.

Have a wonderfully enriching summer!