Thirty high school students and six teachers from Pinewood School’s Upper Campus in Los Altos Hills spent their spring break building a house for a mother and her six children in Tijuana, Mexico.

Spanish teacher David Campbell led the group, which prepared for the trip by meeting 7 a.m. Thursdays for eight weeks. During the breakfast meetings, students and staff studied the history and culture of Mexico as well as how to hammer, nail, saw and measure.

In Tijuana, student leaders Shayma Hesari, Scott Edwards, Courtney Buchanan, Katie Cosner, Andrew Drennan, Matt Dawes and Katherine Mellis led the others in leveling the ground and pouring the foundation. The group built four walls and a roof, wrapped the structure in chicken wire and stuccoed the outside.

All the participants contributed to the success of the construction through their focus on details and their willingness to work long, hard hours, Campbell said.

“Despite each day’s being a brutal physical and mental challenge in an extremely foreign environment, Pinewood’s students showed that Pinewood truly is the difference,” Campbell said.

A charitable organization that works with individual Mexican families organized the trip.