This semester for class instead of reading I chose to work at Beaver Falls elementary school service learning program called Dare2XL. The objective of this program is to help students finish their school work, help them understand their homework and what they are doing in class, all while encouraging the students. Going into the program not knowing what to expect or how to help them, or what I was helping them with, made me nervous and scared. The first day was a little stressful but as we were paired up with one student I was relieved and it wasn’t bad at all. I was paired up with DJ a fourth grader, we worked on his math homework and did extra problems that he was going to learn the next day.
A typical day at the program starts with …show more content…
I never got frustrated or confused, not even disconnected; I always felt connected to the kids I work with because I grew up in a rough neighborhood and had friends in the same situation like the students I am teaching. These students grow up in homes with all different types of situations, their parents may both be together, divorced or they might only have one parent they are dependent on. Also, the students come from different economic classes and Karl Marx explains it best, “two basic social classes-a minority who owned main economic resources of a community and a majority who owned little to nothing” (Pampel, 11). I bring this statement in because most of these students are coming from a social class that own little to nothing and it is a struggle for them every day. Also, Karl Marx talks about alienation on labor and it can kind of relate to how the students are growing up in hard times where their room of creativity is belittled and it’s a struggle for them to get out of poverty. I feel the struggle some of these students are going through in life, the one time I had a student crying because he was struggling in his math and I sat with him the whole time that day. He was freaking out that he wasn’t going to finish and was worried because everyone else was done with their work; I said to him we can get it done, it cheered him up a little till we got the announcement that there was only ten minutes’ till leaving time which made him cry all over. He had two more left and I said cheer up we have two more left we will finish one and I can help you start the last one. Nothing ever can prepare you for what he said next and I had no good response for him. He said to me “I can’t finish it at home I have other things to do like set the table for dinner and I just won’t have time”. All I could say was try and do it
A typical day at the program starts with …show more content…
I never got frustrated or confused, not even disconnected; I always felt connected to the kids I work with because I grew up in a rough neighborhood and had friends in the same situation like the students I am teaching. These students grow up in homes with all different types of situations, their parents may both be together, divorced or they might only have one parent they are dependent on. Also, the students come from different economic classes and Karl Marx explains it best, “two basic social classes-a minority who owned main economic resources of a community and a majority who owned little to nothing” (Pampel, 11). I bring this statement in because most of these students are coming from a social class that own little to nothing and it is a struggle for them every day. Also, Karl Marx talks about alienation on labor and it can kind of relate to how the students are growing up in hard times where their room of creativity is belittled and it’s a struggle for them to get out of poverty. I feel the struggle some of these students are going through in life, the one time I had a student crying because he was struggling in his math and I sat with him the whole time that day. He was freaking out that he wasn’t going to finish and was worried because everyone else was done with their work; I said to him we can get it done, it cheered him up a little till we got the announcement that there was only ten minutes’ till leaving time which made him cry all over. He had two more left and I said cheer up we have two more left we will finish one and I can help you start the last one. Nothing ever can prepare you for what he said next and I had no good response for him. He said to me “I can’t finish it at home I have other things to do like set the table for dinner and I just won’t have time”. All I could say was try and do it