Lila's Third Visit Reflection

Lila Gornick
3/5/15, 3:20 4:20
Boys and Girls Club
Fabiola Kerfoot
fkerfoot@bgcp.org

I am volunteering at Taft Elementary School with the Reading is Freedom program every Tuesday after school for an hour. I as well tutored here last year so I had some ideas about what it would be like going into this year. However, I am tutoring a new student this year, a 3rd grade girl who is at a reading level behind the rest of her class. After my experience last year I expected to be more of a parental figure to a student, trying to encourage her to just start her homework and get through a few problems with me, or one book, instead of being able to intensively tutor her because the student I worked with last year was extremely uncooperative and didn't want to learn. This year my student has pleasantly surprised me, she is willing to cooperate with me sometimes and wants to learn, even though she gets distracted easily. These tutoring experiences have revealed to me that I am a patient person when teaching others. It has also shown me that explaining how to pronounce words and explain simple math concepts are extremely hard and often the student I tutor does not take my suggestions or remember the words I explained to her, so I know that I will need to find a more effective way to explain concepts. I know that I have had an impact on the girl I tutor because she is excited whenever she sees me and she remembered my name the last time I came (my third visit). She has 9 siblings and her teacher informed me that she has confidence issues so I know that I am giving her one on one attention that she needs that she does not receive at school or at home and I believe having more practice reading aloud in English will help build her confidence.

Leslie's First Visit Reflection

Leslie Akin
December 7th, Every Saturday
Ronald McDonald House - Stanford
Monica Makela
mmakela@ronaldhouse.net

Before starting my first visit at the Ronald McDonald House, I had the preconceptions that I would be working with a lot of sick children, with disabilities, and their over protective parents. The issue I am focusing on is creating a home environment for the children and their families. Not only low income families, but families from all over the world visit Stanford Hospital/Lucile Packard Hospital for specific treatments. Some visits are months long, and simply a hotel room would not be reasonable. So, at the Ronald McDonald house we strive to make it as homie and comfortable for all visitors. My work is at the CARE Center, aka the play rooms and outside. My work challenged my preconceptions becuase I worked mostly with the sick children's siblings, most of whom were very shaken up by their families problems. I discovered I am very nervous around sick people, but soon I realized because I had not been very exposed to them I was uncertain what to do. After two visits I had lots of exposure and totally felt comfortable. Although some kids would not be able to respond to me, I would still talk to them. I very much believe I had an impact. I play with the siblings when the parents have to go visit their sick child. I cannot imagine leaving my sick child alone in the hospital, so I have a lot of respect for the parents there. On one girls birthday (I cannot say her name) her parents just dropped her off to me. I realized how upset I would be if that was me. And decided I have to make her birthday special. I may have impacts on the small personal level, but ultimately  I will help a lot of families, and improve the environment's attitude at the house.