Volunteering at Shelter House Community Service Learning Reflection Ima Sample 26 July 200x This past month, I have spent several hours each week serving as a volunteer at Shelter House in Iowa City. It has been a very interesting experience and I feel as though I have learned a great deal. I hope that I can put it all into words. I thought that I would spend most of my time with the children, but it turned out that they usually had something else that needed to be done. As a result, I spent a lot of time listening. I heard the residents¡¦ stories of how they became homeless, their aspirations for the future, and how difficult it was for them to ask for help. It surprised me to discover that everyone there was trying so hard to succeed and were often just beaten back down. I began to wonder what it would be like to have a student from a homeless shelter in my classroom. Their parents are exhausted by the end of the day and there were few other adults who could help them with their homework. In addition, it would be nearly impossible to find a quiet place to study. Another thing that I would be concerned about is how the students feel about themselves and their family situations. While I have been volunteering, all the children in the shelter have been too young to understand their situation or realize that it is different from the lives of other children. However, the adults frequently express how, when they go to work, they do not want to tell their co-workers where they live. Assignments in elementary school frequently include some discussion of home or family life. Upper elementary students will understand that their home life is different and will likely experience the same shame that their parents feel. As a teacher, I want to let those students know that they can talk to me without feeling ashamed. School needs to be a safe and consistent place because their home life probably is not. The interesting thing is that listening, the skill I used the most at the shelter, is a skill that I will have to continue to develop as a teacher. All children, as well as their parents, need to know that their teacher will really listen to them and try to understand. It is easy to jump to conclusions with very little information. It is much harder to truly listen and attempt to understand another point of view. One of the other things that I saw in the shelter was the real love that parents had for their children. I knew that homeless parents did not love their children any less than parents who were not homeless, but that knowledge has a difficult time counteracting the societal view of ¡¥homeless people as lazy people who don¡¦t care about anything¡¦ to which we are all indoctrinated. The parents were tired, but they wanted to be involved. Circumstances beyond their control frequently made that involvement nearly impossible. In my classroom, I want to encourage parent involvement because I think that it leads to better learning for their children, but I will have to realize that some parents who do not participate are unable to participate, rather than unwilling to participate. I have really enjoyed volunteering in the shelter and I am sure that as I continue to volunteer there, I will learn more about myself and how I want to teach, as well as the needs of children and families that are currently homeless. The people that I have met there have made the problem of homelessness real to me. I have gone home ready to cry after handing out bug spray, toothbrushes, toothpaste and razors to people who have no place to go and the shelter has no room for them. Social studies is a class in which these types of issues can be more than discussion points for students; they can, instead, become real to the students by exposing them to people experiencing these types of issues. I am sure that I will know more about the methods I want to use as I continue to make these kinds of issues real to me. Back to Course Page |