Post #10

Blog 10

For my last post, I’ll talk about my last day of working at the school.  When I first got there, all the kids already knew it was my last day, so they gave me really big hugs.  I mean big, obnoxious hugs.  Second graders may be short, but they’re powerful in hugging groups!  I could barely stand.  Anways…

 We started out with the usual morning work and I went around to help them if they raised their hands.  My mom warned me that they would be particularly distracted today, as they usually are on holidays or any other special days.  She was right!  During morning work,  think I might have answered only one question about their work.  Most of the questions were about when I was going to come back and visit, or if I liked IU (NO), or if I was married or had any kids.  Although the questions about marriage freaked me out a little big (Am I really that old?), I felt really loved! 

During lunchtime, I ate at the cafeteria with the kids instead of in the teacher lounge or in the classroom like I usually did.  I had fun hanging out with the little kids!  It makes me really excited for my nannying job this summer; I miss hanging out with little kiddos! 

The rest of the day went basically as normal, and at the end of the day, they all presented me with drawings and cards they made for me!  They were so sweet.  If I can figure out how to upload a picture on here of them I will!  They are adorable and I can’t wait to go back.   I’m really glad I chose to do my service here!  

Post #9

Blog 9

Surprisingly, I really enjoyed the after-school work I did with my mom and her colleagues.  I enjoyed it almost as much as I enjoyed working there during the day.  After school, I stayed with my mom to do some things with her that she normally would do after school.  First, we straightened up the room by putting away books, drawing materials, and some other misplaced things.  Since the desks aren’t regularly cleaned off, I decided to do that for the kids to try to eliminate some germs from the room!  I cannot imagine how many germs must inhabit that place.  Anyway, after that, I helped my mom rearrange the room into rows instead of groups of desks.  She planned out where to put them while I did the manually labor.  Since the teachers don’t like rearranging the rooms and they especially don’t like doing it themselves, I did it for two other teachers, too.  That took a good long while.  I moved the desks in Mrs. Skinner’s room, across from my mom’s room, and Mrs. Roach, who is next door to my mom’s room. 

It has felt nice to give back to them.  They have been so gracious to me through the years since I was one of their students wreaking havoc on the elementary school!  After doing all that, we all relaxed and graded papers while watching American Idol together.  J  After a long, good day of working, we enjoyed some good Subway subs.  I’d say it was a successful day.  

Post #8

Since I talked about the first day of work in my last blog post, I’ll talk about the second day in this post!  The first day ended with me helping my mom some more in the room with individual kids.  This continued the second day when I was able to work one-on-one with some children in the hallway on their morning work.  The kid I mentioned before was one of them, along with some students who were a little behind in any skill, usually reading.  We worked mostly on language arts and reading comprehension.  Maybe the fact that I have not been around kids these age for so long gave me some culture shock!  They were a lot younger, smaller, and less developed than I remembered about second graders.  They really impressed me with their abilities, though!  

Post #7

I had my first day of service at the school!  I had an absolute blast.  It was a little frustrating some of the time, but overall, it was a good time.  The frustration came because the kids were a little antsy all day.  I anticipated that they would be, by my mom said they always had some extra energy when a guest was there.  Since I was there all day, I guess it was an exciting deal for them, so they bounced off the walls a little more than usual today!  There is one kid in particular that put up more of a fight than I’m used to.  I shouldn’t put his name on the internet!  He is just a little younger than the other kids and it shows in his personality and attention span a little bit.  I was able to work with him a lot today because he is often far behind and needs personal attention to catch up.  Teachers and assistants do their best to help catch him up, but there are a lot of children in my mom’s class who need personal help.  That makes it hard to sit him down and make him focus when he really doesn’t want to try. 

At the beginning of the day, they did their morning work.  That consisted of some math, language arts, and word problems.  Luckily, I could solve them by myself, so I proved useful when helping the kids J.  I helped out during the morning with things like that.  During the times when my mom was teaching the science lesson and they worked on some other papers, I went down to the copy room and copied a lot for my mom.  Later I copied a lot for the other teachers in my mom’s hallway!  That took up a lot of the day.  I did that before and after lunchtime.  Although it didn’t feel like I was making a huge impact during that time, I know I was doing a huge favor for those teachers.  I’ll write more soon!

Post #6

With spring break coming up in a few weeks, I decided to make an agenda for the week so I can get in all of my hours!  I’m going to work extra hours on a few of the days now because I am driving to Chicago at the end of the week to see my sister and her family!  I am looking forward to that, but it messes with some of my service hour plans.  No problem, however!  I will just condense.  My schedule is the following: 

On Monday, I will go to school with my mom at 7:30-7:45 like she usually does.  The school day goes until 3:45, so if I work the whole school day for 3 days, I will get 24 hours done!  (I am thankful I am not going on vacation during break so I can knock it out so quickly.)  To finish the other 6 hours, I plan to spend 2 hours with my mom each day after school either working on grading papers or doing other tasks in her room.  She usually stays later anyways since she is an empty-nester now, so there will not be very many accommodations she will have to make for my hours.  If I have done my math correctly, I should be able to complete all of the hours! 

It feels good to know I will be helping my community at home by working with these kids and teachers.  They gave so much to me for so many years.  They also give my mother employment, so I have even more thanks to give!  This spring break will be a productive and rewarding one. 

Post #5

My mom talked to the principal of their  school and they okay-ed me coming over spring break!  In order to complete all of the hours, I’m going to have to spend a lot of time at the school, but I am not worried about that.  If I am home anyways, I would love to visit the school regardless to visit.  I might as well stay a while and help out!  The principal, Danielle Thompson, said I can do whatever tasks wherever I feel wanted and needed.  Since I will be there for a good amount of time, I will probably bounce around to different areas. 

For one day at the very least, I plan to work with my mom in her room.  This way, we can spend time together, and I already know her preferences and teaching styles.  I always graded her papers with her at home, too, so I will help her with that at night.  That way I can get some hours outside of the school day.  Another day, I hope to go see Mrs. Hodgin in the third grade wing of the school.  Mrs. Hodgin has been a teacher at Lantern Road since before I attended, and her husband was my fifth grade social studies teacher.  During the first semester of my senior year of high school, I was her cadet teacher so I got to work with her every afternoon.  She is a fun and spunky lady, so I hope to work with her, too!  I anticipate I will answer phones in the office during their breaks since I have experience with reception at the law firm I worked at last summer.  

Post #4

So, before I said I was going to work at the Humane Society.  Now, that’s not in the plans.  Instead, on spring break, I am going to work at an elementary school!  I am looking forward to it very much because the school is very dear to my heart.  I went there for four years as a kid, my mom works there now, and all of the staff members have been like family since I was a little girl!  Also, in high school, I was a cadet teacher for a third grade class there, so I even feel like I know some of the current little students there.  I am looking forward to it very much!  I think I will be a good thing for me to do, too, because I will be able to be very productive.  Between all the work I have done for my mom and all the things I did as a cadet teacher, I have teacher duties down to a science.  I’ll be able to do some good work for the secretary’s office, for my mom, and for some other teachers there.  I’ll also be able to work one-on-one with some of the kids if they need extra attention.  I did this a lot as a cadet teacher, so I think I have enough experience to help them with their schoolwork.  Also I was a tutor before in the summers for elementary kids, so I know the material and how my mom teaches the different concepts.  I am so thankful for this service!  I think it will be the most productive and beneficial for everybody.  

Post #3

Next week, I am planning to go to the Humane Society with a few of my friends to help out with the animals!  I have known one of my pledge sisters since high school.  I remember her volunteering at different places for animals throughout high school, so I am comfortable with working with her.  I am unsure if it was a humane society or another organization, but she said it was a really fun time regardless.  She said they were able to walk the dogs and play with them outside!  I have been expecting to do some of the less fun tasks like cleaning up animal waste.  She said they did have to do some of that, but they had fun for the most part.  I am really looking forward to giving back to the community.  I’m sure I’m going to want to take the animals home!  Unfortunately, dorms and sororities don’t let dogs in, and I don’t think my parents are up for picking up another family member. 

In addition to working at the humane society, I am going to have to figure out something else to work as a supplement for the extra time.  I am hoping a great and convenient opportunity comes my way!  Hopefully there will be something on a weekend that can knock out a good chunk.  I am all for serving people and I think it is a great thing to do, but it is hard to fit it in with school and activities!  

Post #2

After a few different calls and emails sent this week, I found two new leads for places that may need my unpaid assistance!  I emailed the nearby children’s day care center located right next to my dorm. I also talked to one of my good friends who completes a lot of service hours at the Humane Society in town.  The first one (the day care) said that although they would love to have an extra pair of hands to help, they would have to complete a somewhat extensive background check and it would be more complicated than it’s worth because of all the paperwork necessary to get me a few hours of service.  Even though that will not work, the Humane Society was more promising!  They said they could definitely use hands or supplies or any service.  It may be an issue since I am mildly allergic to dogs, but that still didn’t stop my family from having a golden retriever for 12 years!  I’ll be fine for a few hours.  J   I am thinking I will go there for at least part of the hours, if not all of them.  Instead of just going and giving my time, I think it would be good to bring some of my own materials, too.  On the web site and in my past help with the humane society in my home town, it was really helpful for then when we could bring our own paper towels and other items.  I’m looking forward to working with the animals!  

Post #1

Finding service opportunities to better a community other than Purdue’s students has really been more of a struggle than I anticipated!  Between the fliers and emails I always see and receive about service opportunities, I thought it would be much easier.  It turns out that finding the opportunity to serve is more complicated than the actual act of serving itself!  
Most of the problems I have been running into have to do with the community the opportunities would be helping and the transportation to and from the venue.  Time is also a big constraint because I am doing projects for service to students.  I planned to go work at an after-school program, but it turns out after school for elementary kids isn’t the same as after my school day ends!  The people kids I would hope to serve won’t be there for twenty-four hours!  So, unfortunately, I have to change from that to another service opportunity.  This week I plan to send out a few emails to get the ball rolling on something else!  I want to try to help out somewhere in close proximity to where I live because of my busy schedule and my lack-of-car predicament.  So, to conclude, I’m being a complain-queen because of time and opportunities not matching up.  But on a positive note, I plan to look for other opportunities now!