Blog Post 2: Written

I now have about 4.5 hours logged of volunteer time with my service learning organization, the Lexington Public Library Village Branch. Once I get there and start helping a kid, time flies by. I am still enjoying my time volunteering with the kids. Those 4.5 hours have been split over 2 visits, and generally, I spend a lot of my time helping children with reading homework. Below is a picture of one of the books I helped a child read. He loved all the animals and colors in the book, and laughed every time he struggled with the word “would.”

Another subject I help a lot of kids with is math. Since I’m not super math-minded, I’m always afraid that I won’t remember learning the topic they are going over in school at the time, but I always end up being able to easily help out since the kids are young and the math isn’t advanced. We do lots of addition, subtraction (or as one child called it, “taking away from,”) multiplication, division, word problems, and some of the older kids even solve equations. During my last visit, I helped a 6^th grader solve his equations (like the ones below.)

Overall, the kids never cease to amaze me. I gain a new respect for elementary school teachers every time I am there because I repeatedly realize how hard it can be to explain a simple concept such as, “why an E is silent on the end of some words” or “how to find the greatest common multiple.” Since it’s been quite some time since I was a little kid, I often forget how a child’s mind works. I am always so impressed at how well they catch onto things and pick up so many concepts and ideas on their own. I absolutely love helping them, especially when you see that light bulb over their head after they have just made sense of something you are trying to help them with. Even though they still have many years of schooling ahead of them, they are already so bright and so wise.