Day four turned out to be a wonderful day! Breakfast was delicious! I had fresh wheat bread with scrambled eggs and an apple! It is the BEST breakfast ever! I am trying to be a little lighter today than yesterday. (let's see how that truly works out!) We went on the bus which brought us to downtown Maastricht, where we hopped on a train, and fifteen minutes later we were at the college. We visited a college where all the students are going to become teachers. We had tea and coffee waiting for us and some dutch cookie with caramel in the center. The dutch are such wonderful and relaxed people. We had a short lecture on dutch educational system, which was mostly repeated information from what Rene and the principal of the Dalton school taught us. This particular school provides primary education students with a four-year program where they start going into the schools. In fact, every three weeks, they spend the entire week in the school. I think the US students should spend way more time in the classroom in their earlier years to make sure they like the profession.
After the lecture, we went to a drama class, where we were greeted by a outspoken drama teacher. We were able to join the class and played a skit game, which was lots of fun! I enjoyed getting to know a few of the dutch girls and figuring out how we were going to act our word "child" for the class. I was glad that the two girls we worked with knew some English. The language barrier is such a hard thing to deal with! :/ It was a fun time and we enjoyed getting to guess everyones word! Next, we went to Math class and the professor lectured and then we learned two ways to learn how to multiply large number: the traditional way, and the new way called the "columns". Halfway through the class, the professor made us break up in pairs and work with the Dutch students to solve a few problems. It was nice getting to chat and see what the Dutch culture is all about through the viewpoint of other college students. I talked to a few girls and they were amazed I was from NY and they want to go ASAP! They all lived within about 40 minutes from the university and still lived with their parents. The colleges in the Netherlands don't typically have rooming for students. It was a fabulous experience just to hear stories about dutch culture and how they are in the schools way sooner than education majors in the USA (Well at least UMD's program). 
The college invited us for lunch, which were sandwiches (Turkey YAY) and fruit and tea/coffee. I took a banana, orange, and apple for the road because there were lots of extras! I am thankful that I can eat some fruit for snacks because of the college! :) I wish the Dutch students could have eaten with us, but all of the girls on the trip had great conversations during lunch. The boys were off flirting with Dutch girls from the music class they went to! huh Oh boys! I noticed that the college students were all the same race and I'm sure from a similar socioeconomic class. I wonder why this is!! Does the CITO exam discriminate among races-in similar ways like the SAT does? I've written about 20 pages on the controversies of the SAT for an English class and it seems like the CITO may have the potential to have similar issues like many of the other standardized tests.
We were going to take a city tour, but the weather was rainy so that will be tomorrow! I'm excited about that! :)
We got back and I relaxed and organized for a little bit. I ended up going to a run!!! It felt amazing! I miss my gym routine and eating more healthier. I went for about two 20 minutes runs at 5:15pm, and went around the sketchy area by the hotel. Well it isn't sketchy, it's just very dark and as a female in a foreign country, I felt vulnerable when alone at night. I felt like a million dollars after my run though! :D
At 6:30pm Stacy made us all get together to regroup and talked about the upcoming days. I was super upset that many of the boys were on their phones when Stacy was talking. We are all so fund of Stacy and I find it so rude that members of the group would disrespect Stacy like that! I can get frustrated with my generation and how we are obsessed with technology. It's been fabulous within a phone! I have so much more time to relax! :-) I am going to try and take that back with me to the USA and rely less on my iphone! :) Dirk told us how proud he is of us..and I said, "Are we leaving to go home soon?" And the group laughed! I am finding myself very comfortable and can be myself with the group, which is fabulous. Stacy is so kind and genuine, I still cannot believe how positive she always is!! I find her to be a wonderful role model for all of us!! Anyway we discussed how everything was going and a little bit about the school trips we already took and a little about the upcoming weekend to PARIS! Rene gave an informative meeting all about Paris! The hotel is super far from the city, so we will have to use the metro, but I am sure it will still be a blast! I am interested in seeing how Paris is round number 2! The meeting went a little longer than expected so most of us were starving!! We ended up at an Italian restaurant. I couldn't make a decision so I went basic with a margarita pizza-I ate the WHOLE thing! ;) I was starving! The first day I only ate half of my pizza. This just shows how hungry I truly was! It was nice to talk to Dana, Jake, Danny, Matt, Christina, and Amy! We had some great conversations. I'm so glad the group worked out! Next, we failed at finding a bar, so some of the girls ditched the bar scene and went home to hang. I kind of wish Stacy would switch the roommate up, just so everyone can get closer to a different person. It's an idea for next year!
Tomorrow is Jake's 21st birthday! :D I'm excited to go to dinner and out for celebrations! (I can't believe I haven't been out yet!!) BOOOO!
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