This semester I have been taking a Communications course that counts for both my General Studies and Accounting degree. It has been one of my favorite classes by far. When I am sick and confused from math and science, it's nice to go into a class where I get to talk to fun people and we get to observe the different things we do everyday. I've had a lot of fun!
In the class, we are required to do a 12 hour service project. I know what you're thinking... "12 Hours?!! That's ridiculous!" Yep I know. The friends I've talked to that have taken the class in high school or early college have all said that they had to do a 8-10 hour project. If you don't know by now, my year has been a bit 'unlucky' right now so I've kind of just learned to deal with stuff like that. Something like that is bound to happen to me at some point.
But in all honesty, I wish the project had been LONGER. Once a week in February, my group and I would go to a local elementary and help the teachers with pretty anything they needed help with for about 4 hours. Sometimes we would help the students during class, other times we would grade papers, take displays down, put displays up, distribute papers, go to assemblies (we went to one teaching the kids about procrastination ;)), anything like that.
My favorite days were when we were actually able to work with the kids. The first graders were my favorite! They were so sweet and did the funnest things! They were learning how to use 'Paint' on the computer and we would have to help them learn how to use different tools. So much fun! We would pull kids out individually and have them read a story to us so they could practice their reading. After a couple hours, the first graders and I had a special bond. As the day went on, I started to love these kids more and more and they started to like me and my friends just as much as we liked them! One little girl came in from recess and gave me a big hug as soon as she ran into the classroom. She then said something like: "What'syourfavoriteprincess?!!!!" (Yes she really did say it that fast). I laughed and said: "Probably Rapunzel, but I also really like Tiana and Belle." She yelled: "Me too! Which movies do you have?" I was starting to feel like I could really pull off this first grade teacher thing. Maybe I should switch my major? But by the end of the day I had changed my mind...haha.. NO....
Don't get me wrong, I LOVE little kids. But when you have a classroom of 20 to 30 of them running around crazy, you start to wish that there were only 3 of them. I was asked to start a game of Bingo. I don't know what it is, (some weird chemical in the game box perhaps?) but every kid LOVES Bingo! It must be something in those little colored chips (you know those colored thin circles that every single teacher from your old school used to have) that makes them crazy!!! By the end of the game, there were chips scattered all over the room, Bingo cards on the floor, and I had temporarily lost my hearing from a couple of boys yelling "BINGO! BINGO! BINGO!" in my ear every 10 seconds.
After the games with the first graders, I walked out into the hall with 2 other guys from my group. We each breathed a sigh of relief and my hearing was restored. The hallway also smelled fresh ;) Then and there, I decided that teaching was not for me (at least not with that many kids) and I wished that the teachers got paid more. We headed over to the 4th and 6th grade classes where it was MUCH nicer.
This was such a great experience for me and the members of my group! As crazy as it was sometimes, I kind of wish I still had a little more chaos like that in my life to make it more exciting. Teachers have such a hard job! I can now appreciate them so much better! I was also able to get to know my group members better. Sometimes as we were correcting papers and organizing supplies, we would talk about our favorite movies, foods, celebrity crushes (like whether or not we would leave whoever we were with for Harrison Ford or Katy Perry ;)) and the one married group member would give the rest of us single 19 year-olds marriage advice. :)
If there were one thing I could say to each of those kids it would be to enjoy this time you have now in your younger years because it flies so fast!! One day you're a little kid learning how to read, playing Bingo, learning about the solar system, and the next you're in college trying to figure out what in the heck you want in life. It's so confusing!
I found this the other day and I just had to smile... http://www.buzzfeed.com/daves4/things-that-look-just-like-childhood. It brings back fun memories!
