GEN 101 #1

Sara
GEN101- reflective journal

In the beginning of November, I went to Heard Start with several of my friends who also needed to perform their community service. When we first got there, the ladies at the front desk spilt us up into several groups. My friend Shannon and I stayed inside and went to one of the classrooms, while my other three friends went outside to play with the kids. As we were leaving to go to the classroom, one of the desk ladies was mumbling to the other about how “all them kids waiting on the very last minute to do our community service”. When I first walked into the classroom, all the kids were already broken up into groups and were having play time. The teacher introduced herself and told us that the kids ranged from ages three to five. I felt a little awkward and wasn’t really sure what to do with myself. That was until one of the kids ran up to me, grabbed my hand, and demanded that I play blocks with him. Next thing I knew, I found myself sitting on a colorful rug, surrounded with toys and toddlers. It was so much fun sitting there and playing with all the kids, who each wanted your full attention totally dedicated to them. It was weird how quickly I learned some of the personalities of the kids. There was one little trouble maker who kept knocking over the massive block towers, other who was convinced he was a firefighter, there was a little boy who spoke very little English who was glued to my side, and a little girl who sat in the corner all by herself coloring. Another really cool thing about the whole experience was that a few of the kids were Spanish speaking, and the teacher, who was multilingual, spoke to them in both English and Spanish.

After working and being with the kids for only two hours, I was considering becoming a teacher. I was so happy and had so much fun working with the kids. It was so different than dealing with high school kids or even college students. These children were so excited and happy to see you, and they had unlimited question for you. They were a bit rowdy at times, but they were so young. Elementary teachers have such an impact on young children’s lives. I still remember every single one of my teachers kindergarten through sixth. And I remember which ones were nice and sweet and made me want to be there, and the ones that made me not so excited to go to school. If I do so choose to pursue a teaching path, this experience is defiantly one of the reasons that I would have chosen to do so. Working with the kids just made me so happy and I think that it would be the kind of job that would make me excited to go to work. It’s a hard decision to try and make right now though because I am currently enrolled as a biology major. I do enjoy taking sciences but it’s a lot more work than I anticipated. When I was talking to my parents about it, they did tell me that nothing worth it is easy.

One of the course experiences that I felt most closely related to going to Head Start was when everyone shared a personal artifact with the class. The two reminded me of each other because when I was in kindergarten, every week we would have show and tell and share with classmates something close to us. Also both experiences gave me a better understanding of the two different groups that I would be working with. The personal artifacts in class helped in getting to better know everyone; I learned that many people, like myself, love the beach and I also found out that Erin grew up in a town very close to my home town, which is unusual since we both grew up so far away from The Mount.