Reflection Of A Community Experience: Volunteer Experience

Decent Essays
Volunteer Experience Reflection I dedicated fifteen hours to the Head Start Program. For 8 weeks I helped in the classroom and met 25 beautiful children. Each child was unique in their own way. The Head Start Program is predominately White but that didn’t change how they interacted with one another. My experience with Head Start was special and I love to volunteer there again.
Services Provided When the students were at breakfast I would sit with them and talk with them. I helped clean up after they were finishing and get the students ready for story time. While reading I would make sure all the kids are sitting and listening to the teacher. Then it’s choice time and that’s when the kids have forty five minutes to do any activity of choice.
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Observing and catching things that they did not. For example if one of kids were arguing, I would try to help them get to a solution. If I could not help I would then get a teacher. When observing I noticed that the kids were all wide spread some more mature than others. Some ready for kindergarten and some not just yet.
Diverse Experience The Head Start Program does not have a diverse population. Predominately White with two Hispanics and one African-American little girl. I think that’s because outside the university, Shippensburg is not that diverse also because the classroom is small. I did learn that they still played with one another and treat each other equally. They never had a problem with getting along because of color of skin or because someone appeared differently. Only thing I did notice was that the girls mostly played with the girls while the boys mostly played with boys. Intersectionality refers to entirely of a person’s dimension of difference and social identities (Cox, Trice & Long 2015 p. 9). I never really interacted with family so I do not know much about their intersection issues. I don’t know all about their background but you can tell the kids come from different
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Depending on what the child said she would talk to the family about it.
Field of Practice Social workers in school setting faces may challenges. Since they are involved with students they have to deal with multiple problems like behavioral problems, truancy, inappropriate appearance and health issues (Cox, Trice & Long 2015 p. 121). In my experience I noticed a lot of truancy. I volunteered for 8 weeks and I only seen two of the kids once. I know one of the students father keep in touch to say his child was coming back but I also know they said that she might be removed from the attending list. The social worker had to get involved to figure out why the students were missing so many days of school.
Conclusion
I learned that kids come from different backgrounds and they all have different abilities. I want to go into child welfare so working with kids was the best way to get some type of incite. I learned more about being involved with the family and child. We talked about it but I understand it more because I can see why working with the family is so important. The function of a household can determine how efficient a child might be at school. I witness this at the Head Start

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