We kicked the project off by waking up close to the same time as school and heading to Sheltering Arms, a childcare development center with 15 locations all throughout Atlanta. The location we went to was the Centennial Olympic Park location, located about a few blocks away from Georgia Tech. The center was very nice and looked fairly new. Once we walked in, we met with the director of volunteering, Beth Zimmerman. Beth was really cool and she placed us in the classrooms that needed the most help. She also told us some rules that the children must obey at Sheltering Arms.
After we met with Beth, it was time for me and Claire to split up. Once Beth took Claire to her classroom, she took me to mine. I had Classroom #9, which was Ms. Rawls's pre-kindergarden class. At Sheltering Arms, each classroom has a specific number to make it easier to decipher which kids and teachers are in their class. I started to pick up the children's names really quickly. A lot faster than I thought I would. Before long, I knew all five names of the kids in the classroom. Since this week is their spring break, there are not as many kids at the center. So I also picked up Classroom #10's kids names rapidly as well. The teacher told me I could take pictures of the kids, so I snapped several adorable photos of the children. However, since they were all already so adorable it was not that difficult for the photos to be that way as well. After hours of playing and me starting to realize that I could never be a pre-school teacher, it was almost time for our lunch break. I had also talked to the teacher for a while and she was really interesting. It was cool to see how much she loves teaching and to witness her apply that in a real world environment with her own students.
After lunch break, Claire and I switched classrooms. Beth gave us the thumbs up to switch so we can feel the different environment of the children. I then got put with Classroom #4, which mostly consisted of nine energetic, screaming, one and two year olds. They were quiet at first because they had just woken up from their naps, but then it got real loud real quick. The teacher was Ms. Desinique, and she was really nice and cool like Ms. Rawls. After an hour of trying to get them to go outside, different ones kept doing things to make them not go outside. When everyone was lined up, one little boy named Logan kept throwing toys, so that would keep the whole class from going outside for a while. We finally got them outside and played with them on this beautiful sunny day for an hour. They rode on tricycles, ran around, pushed the empty swings, and some sat with me and played with my hair on a bench. When it was time go outside they sat at the tables and did their individual "centers". They played with plastic insects and looked at them with magnifying glasses. Then they listened and danced to songs and sang the ABCs. After an exhausting day it was time for me to leave. Claire and I left and told each other about our fun-filled day spent volunteering at Sheltering Arms. We then went home and blogged and logged about our days. I can't wait to see what Sheltering Arms is like tomorrow!
Great job ;o) xo
ReplyDelete