My Service Learning Experience

Last semester I was in a 1st grade class at an Auburn City School.  I absolutely loved every second of it.  That was my time of the week that I always looked forward to.  My teacher had been teaching for many years and had a lot of experience.  She was a great person to shadow because of her experience and great advise.  My first graders were a very diverse bunch.  I had a sweet little girl with down syndrome, a little girl who was somewhat delayed, a little boy who was dyslexic, and a few children with attention deficit problems.  My first graders were also diverse in the sense that there were many different races.  

What a typical Wednesday looked like in my first grade class:

12:00 arrive to class and kids were finishing up lunch

12:10-12:35 kids went to recess, but if there were strugglers that hadn't finished some of their work they would stay behind in class with me

12:40-1:15 my teacher would teach math and I would help

1:20-1:45 I would help a small group of kid with spelling, because their tests were on Thursday

1:50-2:20 the kids had P.E. and I would help my teacher with whatever she needed help with

2:20-2:30 pack up, listen to afternoon announcements, go home

I really enjoyed working with my spelling student group.  Usually the group of students was the same each week, but sometimes I would have a couple of new students.  I enjoyed this because I felt like it was just what these students needed.  Sometimes a child just needs that little bit of extra attention and I felt like that was where I came in need.  

One girl in my class was a little delayed in her learning.  She had not been diagnosed with any type of special needs, however, it would take her a little extra time to do most things.  She was one of my regular students in my spelling group.  At the beginning of the semester she needed lots of help, but by Thanksgiving she was already doing much better.  Just a couple of weeks before Thanksgiving her mom sent in a paper that she said her daughter had used to practice her spelling words on.  The said spelling words were written in pen, which first graders almost always use pencil.  It was on loose leaf paper, which first graders almost always use their special handwriting paper.  Each word was written backwards with the letters also written backwards.  The little girl had never shown signs of dyslexia before except for maybe a letter written backwards here and there.  Also, from what I have experience with students with dyslexia the word and letters aren't perfectly written backwards like the paper her mom had sent had shown.  So, when my teacher showed me this I was instantly suspicious.  I felt like her mom realized that she was a little cognitively delayed and wanted her to maybe be in special education.  I never found out the result, but my cooperating teacher also agreed with me that it was suspicious.

Overall, I loved my service learning experience.  It almost made me wish I wasn't doing special education and that I was doing elementary education.  However, I know that God has given me the gift of working with children with exceptionalities and I truly have a passion for it.  The kids in my class were so great and would always just come right over to me when I got there and give me a hug.  Sometimes one of them would run up to me and say Miss Brennan guess what I did this past weekend or I lost my tooth today!  It was always the highlight of my week.  The love that kids can give is so great and heart warming.

until next time.

happy learning.