Since early October, I have been blessed with the opportunity to work with the kids in the YMCA afterschool program at Howe Elementary School in Green Bay two times per week. It has been a very impactful and informational experience and has had many takeaways throughout it. Listed below are my top 10 takeaways from this experience:
- My biggest and most important takeaway from village project so far is that even though kids can be challenging to work with sometimes, it is still my passion to work with them and help them become better students and better people
- Just because a child can’t entirely or perfectly complete a task, it doesn’t mean they haven’t shown or won’t show growth
- Children from different parts of the state, even if they’re not that far apart, can show very different behaviors, both for the better and the worse
- Little things such as going out of your way to talk to them can go a long way
- Children are very observant of your actions
- Children know of a lot of adult-like (oftentimes inappropriate) things, so it’s important to be aware of it and stress to them that it doesn’t belong in the classroom
- It can be very difficult to get some kids to listen, so it is important to continue trying to get your point across to them and use different tactics to grab their attention
- This experience has put into perspective how some kids are grateful for the smallest things that I sometimes took for granted as a kid
- All children are good deep down, it just takes longer to see it in certain kids than others sometimes
- I have also taken away that kids do a lot of things that they aren’t even aware of themselves, so it’s important to point it out to them to make sure they become aware of it, especially if it’s a negative behavior
