So this last meeting with the preschoolers was actually probably the smoothest one. They listened so well and really enjoyed what we were doing. Alana and I decided to change up the style of paper that we give to the preschoolers. They don't know how to spell or read, so they always have to ask us for help, which is kind of straining since there's a lot of kids in the class. We decided to style them so that they could draw the different things instead of writing them. This went a lot better and they were a lot more involved than they were previously! They really love to draw and color, so we let them be creative with this one. It was much more enjoyable for them and a lot more fun.
This week, I've focused on cards for all my teachers on teacher appreciation week. I've made 7 of them, thanking my teachers for all of the effort they pour into teaching and reminding them how much I appreciate and love them! This has been the best because I love lifting people up and reminding them of their worth.
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The firefighters so far have sent one letter to the preschoolers while the preschoolers have sent two letters to the firefighters. We've had two different days with them since the last blog! In each one we've played a game and they wrote their letters to the firefighters, this time with prompts like "My favorite food is..." or "My Easter plans were..." It's really funny because they're starting to forget Alana and I's names so they just call us the "firefighter girls". They've been getting really excited whenever we come and they always come up to us and ask if we are going to play a game or when the next letter from the firefighters will come. They've also been learning a lot, since they don't really know how to write yet. They've been mastering which letter in the alphabet is which in class, so when they're writing their letters back to the firefighters they'll ask me "how do you spell _____" which helps them grow in their writing abilities. The girls think it's really cool to get letters from female firefighters and I even overheard one girl telling her friend that she wanted to be a firefighter when she got older. We've prepared and tried to play a couple of videos of the fire station for the kids to see, but the software that Beth used wasn't capable of working on an Apple Product. We started with a flash drive, then a CD, and now the preschool teacher (Ms. Tasha) is bringing in her home laptop to see if it will work on that. We've played a few games, one being "Firefighter says" like Simon says, and another being "Hot vs Not Hot" and it was a relay race, and recently we played hot potato. The relay race didn't go very well because the kids starting yelling and hitting each other, so we had to stop hahaha. The fire station supplied fire safety coloring books for the kids, which they really love to do and that really helps with time. It's been really fun getting to know the kids and whenever we go there we always leave feeling so loved with all the kids fighting to give us hugs goodbye. Next time we meet, we will plan on watching the video. We are still working on the rest of the plans! This is a pic of a girl asking me for help getting marker off of her hands. It was cute so I thought I'd include it hahaha.
Encouragement cards.So with a continuation of the cards and the Pen-pal project, there has been a lot of work and progress. Every day I've been working on and delivering cards that I've made and that has been super fun for me.
Pen Pals.Alana and I have gotten the opportunity to meet Beth Gulley, the communications and fire safety director at the sugar creek fire department. We had been in communication with her through emails and phone calls, but this was the first chance we got to actually meet her in person. She's a really outgoing, funny, and kindhearted person and she was so willing to help us in whatever way we needed and was really into our project. When we got there she had a folder full of stuff that she had been planning for this project and it was super cool to see that she was that interested. We talked about our projects and the plans for probably about an hour or so. She mentioned that she had coloring books, plastic firefighter hats, pencils, etc. She told us that she would have a couple videos for us to show the preschoolers the outside of the fire station, the letters written with the pictures of the firefighters attached to the papers so the preschoolers could see their specific firefighter. She told us that she would drop off the letters, coloring books, pencils, stickers, flash drive, and everything we discussed about needing at the school Monday morning before we left to go meet the preschoolers for the first time. We also planned a day for the firefighters to come in and actually meet the kids, which is going to be so cool. After we talked about everything that we needed to, Beth and the head fire chief at the department showed us around literally the whole entire department. It was really cool but it took forever and was a ton of information haha. After that, we met with Mrs. Williamson and told her all the plans and told her we would be planning to meet the preschoolers with her the upcoming Monday. Once we got to the preschoolers, we felt pretty unprepared. We talked about changing the day that we receive Beth's stuff/making the pick up day different than usual so that we had more time to prepare. We got to the preschooler room and it was chaotic. They would not listen at all and they were so talkative and crazy. We started by introducing ourselves and explaining what we would be doing with them. We continued by passing out their individual letters and they all couldn't read them so they took turns asking us to read them for them. They thought it was so cool that a firefighter was interested in talking to them. We were then going to show the video, and Beth put it in this really cool powerpoint for us, but then the video didn't work, which stunk. They were all so excited for the video too which was disappointing. We just decided we would figure it out another day and save it for next time. We told them to go back to their seats and write their names on the letters so they could keep track of which firefighter they had. Most of their handwritings were not legible at all so I had to rewrite them underneath their attempt. Most of the firefighters didn't color in the firetruck on the back of their pen-pal paper so the preschoolers decided to finish that for them. We then passed out the coloring books and told them that they could color the first page after they wrote their name on the inside. The kids really liked interacting with me and Alana too and there was one girl (I forget her name) that kept hugging me and sitting on my lap and before I left she told me she loved me and she didn't want me to leave. Which was really funny and so cute. We didn't really get any pictures once we got in the preschool classroom because it was so chaotic but next week we are going to try to be a lot better about that. This next Monday we are planning on showing the video and playing a game called the "hot/cold game" and also coloring. We will see how it goes!
The kids have continued to work on their art projects for their teachers and they've turned out so good! They've really used their creativeness to express their love for these specific teachers. Mrs. Williamson has been leaving us alone with the kids so that we could learn how to lead them and how to teach them skills! So it's been kind of difficult but fun getting to know how to tame these kids! Haha. As the kids started to finish their paintings, we opened up the idea to them to write letters to Mrs. Williamson, who had been helping us this whole time. She always talks about filling other people's buckets, so we decided to fill hers! We have to bind the pages together and after we do that, we're going to give that to her as a gift along with maybe a little coffee mug or something. :-) It was really cool to see how the kids expressed their appreciation for Mrs. Williamson. They all mentioned in their cards that they loved her and that she was an amazing person. (Which is so true!!) We met with Mrs. Williamson about the preschool/firefighter pen pal project and we got a lot resolved. We figured out what we needed to change about our first pen pal worksheet and came up with new ideas. Alana and I are planning on meeting with the fire department and taking videos of them showing us around the department that way we can show this to the preschoolers when we are with them. Each kid is going to be assigned to a firefighter and we will be visiting the preschoolers on Tuesdays. We are going to divide each activity up between 5 minutes per section. First we will start with a 5 minute video, then they will take 5 minutes to read their letters from their specific firefighter, then they will take the rest of class to write back to their firefighters. We are going to have a few meetings with the fire department, which we need to call and schedule, that way we can get everything planned and figure out which firefighter will be with each preschooler. I've had a lot of down time in class, so I decided to pick up on another project and make encouragement cards for people that are on my heart. I've tried to be really attentive to someone that I can encourage through a hard time in their life or just a random appreciation letter. This has really been encouraging to me to know that I can make an impact with these words. It always means so much to me whenever someone thinks of me and writes a card for me, so this is why I decided to pick up on this project. I've made a couple cards for friends, teachers, and family who I felt needed encouragement. This has been so fun to me because I love art and I love encouraging others! Cards that I've made! I gave the cards that I wrote for the teachers to the office so that they could give it to them. I passed one of the teachers in the hallway and she gave me the biggest hug and told me that I had no idea how much this meant to her right now and how badly she needed it. It made me smile so much. These are the kids that we've been working with in our painting projects and what they've been working on for their teachers.
Alana and I have continued to take weekly trips to the elementary school to paint with the kids there. Recently, the kids decided that they were done with their paintings and ready to give them to their parents. We planned for the kids to come into the room and continue with their paintings, but Mrs. Williamson brought in a whole new group of kids and let me tell you, they were SO HYPER. So, Alana and I decided to go onto our next project spontaneously. This group of kids are painting something to give to their favorite teacher. They all got really excited at the thought of giving something like this to their teachers. With this project, we plan to give these paintings as a gift and a note to the teachers in order to make them feel appreciated and cared about. The kids have started to brainstorm their ideas on what they wanted to include on their paintings. Alana and I had the kids go around in a circle and say their favorite part about the person sitting to their right. This was really encouraging to me because they noticed little things about each other and nobody had the same answers. This sparked ideas between Alana and I to have different prompts for them to talk about each time that we come. A few of them might be: 1) What's your favorite part about yourself? 2) What is your favorite animal? 3) What is your favorite gift you've ever received? A lot of times, especially with this new group, it gets a little bit loud in the small room that we are in because they are all so talkative and excited to be there. These questions help the kids to listen to each other and be able to see the creativity, similarities, and differences between everyone there. I'm really excited to start putting together the bundles for the teachers once the kids get to painting! We have also poured time into contacting the communications director at the Fire Department. We emailed Beth Gulley, and she hasn't gotten back to us yet but we are planning emailing her again today. We formed a few different documents as templates for what the preschoolers will send to the firefighters.
There has been a complete change in plans! I've started to really invest in my passions with art and helping others at the elementary school. There is a group of around 5 kids that come in and paint. We provide them each with 2 paint brushes, the paint, water, and canvases. Currently, they are working on Valentine's Day canvas paintings for their parents to receive as a gift. Typically, once we get to the school we lay out a huge white piece of paper so that the paint doesn't get on the table. We've started to write their names on the piece of paper next to their paintings and they get so excited about that. We also fill up little cups of water for them to dip their paint brushes in and guide them if they have any questions. They are instructed to raise their hand and ask politely if they need new paint colors! The kids started with drawing what they thought they'd want to paint on a piece of paper and when they were ready they started trying to recreate their idea onto an actual canvas. They are all super careful with how they use the paint. They always get so excited when you ask them simple questions like "how many siblings do you have?" or "what's your favorite color?" I've really gotten to know each of the kids and Mrs. Williamson, who is the person guiding and helping us with the whole process!
I've partnered with Alana Hartley throughout this whole process and we have many new brainstormed ideas! We've started to plan something with the preschoolers there and partnering them with local firefighters to be "pen pals" with. We are planning on writing short letters back and forth between the two and comparing between both of their lives. Mrs. Williamson was so excited about this idea! We are working on worksheets, coloring pages, and pen pal questions to ask the preschoolers and firefighters! So! Natalie and I started to realize how timely it would take to write personalized letters to over 200 freshmen, so we decided to focus on the students that answered the box "What do you struggle with?" on our survey that we sent out. So Natalie and started working and we made around 50 more cards. We started to personalize certain people's cards more and draw the things that they were passionate about like music, art, sports, or computer games. I really enjoyed personalizing the cards not only on the insides but on the outsides too. With the close of this project, I've been searching for new ideas for my next semester's project. I wanted to pick back up on the music therapy at Woodland Terrace. As of now, my brainstorming plans look like this:
On Mondays, my plan is to tag along with Alana Hartley and visit the elementary schools to do art therapy with kids that have a harder time in school or at home. With the art that they make, they will go in bundles to the residents at Woodland Terrace that I would be later doing music therapy to. On Tuesdays, I will take the art from Monday, and bring my guitar to Woodland Terrace and do music therapy to the residents there that have been least visited. On Wednesdays, I will go back to Woodland Terrace and do interviews to the residents that I visited the day before. These questions will be basic questions about their lives. On Thursdays, I will begin to put together "memory books" for the residents that I interviewed. This will consist of memories in their lives based on the interview questions. They will be able to look back on their life through a book form! On Fridays, I will continue working on the books. This format is my plan as of today, but I still have to wait for some emails and calls back to make sure this plan is completely possible!! Can't wait for everything to come together! :-) |
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