This is Shannon's Summer of Service Blog and you should all go and read it. That is all.


http://indiasummerofservice.blogspot.com/

Final Blue Lake Post (#7)

I am back in Deland now. Blue Lake is over. These past two and a half months have been INCREDIBLE! I made such close friends, several who will be in my life for eternity, and I have made  a large impact on a bunch of kids. The kids not just in my cabin, but all through out the camp looked up to me a lot this whole summer. I had great fun with the other counselors, and learned a lot from the faculty. While I do not intend to spend another summer at Blue Lake, I am unbelievably grateful that I was there this summer. I feel more prepared as a college student, and infinitely more ready to become a teacher. I learned a lot of great lessons from a lot of great people.

Blue Lake Entry #6

Session four is about half way over. The kids this session are extremely awesome! I love my cabin so much! They are a big group of goof balls! It is getting really sad because we are having to say goodbye to every one. Us counselors have been together for over two months (lifeguards over 2 1/12). We have grown so close. However, I am extremely homesick. I am looking forward to the flight home! I miss my family and Ashley SO much! Back to the kids.... I am leading the kids in the whole unit a lot this session. I ave been handed several leadership roles. The kids all seem to be taking fairly wel to my instructional methods. I really think I am getting to make a positive impact on a whole lot of students!

Weaving

Sometimes it's hard to come up with activities for the kids because not a lot of them like to participate despite hours of planing. However, one of the projects that we worked on this summer was a weaving frame. I got the idea from CityArts-in the cafeteria they have a similar sized framed from weavings kids have done and it looks like cool. For Wanskuck we decided to do a similar frame since we have kids dropping by for 3 hours straight so it's an ongoing thing. From the picture above you can see the different patterns and prints we got. We realized that this activity calms the kids down, which is great since they can get really hyper and rowdy 

Amanda, (girl above) is one of the sweetest girls from Wanskuck. One day, she took me to a corner and pulled out a little stuffed kitty (photo above) from her backpack and gave it to me. I asked her why me out of all the other teachers, and she raised her shoulders and said "because." It was really sweet of her and I kept it.

That same week, I visited RISD for an info sesh since I want to go there after Stetson. The photo above is a shot of their librabry, which used to be a bank. Just another reason why I'm dying to go there!

Courtney - Week 8

So technically my SOS is over... but I'm going to be doing a ton more hours. Last week, I took Big Emily to see Dark Knight Rises, it was fantastic. We had such a great time just the two of us going out and finding fun things to do. I got her back a little late, oops, but I got to talk with her case worker. I'm going to start working with her this summer and taking her to equine therapy. They asked me to drive her to her meetings and participate. I think that will be a great way for her to get out some of her feelings.  I'm also taking her horseback riding this weekend as part of her birthday present.

I've also had meetings with everyone and their brother concerning Bonner Orientation. We have everything in lists and ready to go for next week. I can't believe the new Bonners get here next week! All of this planning has really got me excited to start out this year.

NYC & Sound Sesh (week 4)

So I had the chance to visit NYC, which was AWESOME since i had never been! The first place that I went to was Times Square and it was packed!  

We went to the 9/11 memorial

Explored the city!

A little after coming back from NYC, CityArts partook of an event called "Sound Session" in Dtown where there was music, performances, food, and tons of fun! We were in charge of "Kid City." Our station  was the "Head piece" station where kids could walk by and create fun masks or head pieces. I helped a lot of girls make fun little head bands with feathers, glitter, yarn, etc. The other Cityarts kids were in stations in charge of musical instruments, flags, banners, and so on. We were there for about 3 hours, which went by super fast! 

There were so many things going on around us! There was a guy giving "drop in" music lessons to random people, so it was similar to a drum circle. There were break dancers right in front of us, there was food everywhere! we had a great time to say the least.

My fifth post... about to start session 4

Session three has ended, and now I am preparing for the last session. his session I was able to do a lot musically with the students. I worked with the top wind band, gave several private lessons, and performed four concerts. I was able to guide countless middle schoolers who looked up to me with the utmost admiration. However, I want to come home. I am exhausted physically, mentally, and emotionally. I just want to see my girlfriend again. I want to be home. This has been an awesome experience, but ten weeks is way too long to be completely isolated from every one. Every one else here is fairly local so they get to see their friends, family and significant others over breaks. If not then their significant other is here with them, or they do not have one. This has been a lonely road, I made a bunch of friends, but I do not have her. The awesomeness of this experience and the potential to inspire for another to weeks has been completely shaded by my heart sickness. 

Week 7(7/22-7/28):

The ending to an amazing summer of service at least logging hour wise. Once again we had campaigners and of course getting kids there is always the hardest challenge. We didn’t have as many as last week but the weather outside was pretty bad so that could have been part of it. Something interesting though this random guy knocked on the door of the YL house and asked if he could stay while it was down pouring outside. We let him in and started campaigners allowing him to get involved too. We did this pipe cleaner thing where you have two pipe cleaners one being God and the other you and you would intertwine them however you wanted exemplifying your closeness to God since getting back from camp. Since the one guy didn’t go to camp he started form the beginning of his life saying how he went to catholic school and then during college went to church and all but stopped when I believe his dad died. But he said that day he was close to God because of what happened and the chances of him asking for shelter from the rain and being a part of Campaigners with us. It is so amazing how God works through the lives of people not even involved in YL yet still through YL. I am super stoked for this school year and YL to start up again. I have no doubt in my mind this is going to be a year of many awesome memories and stories that will last a lifetime. Random insert: I would just like to say frisbee golf is awesome and should totally be a part of Bonner somehow someway. Alright that is all.  

Week 6(7/15-7/21):

The main focus of this week was to get kids to campaigners. Before I go on I guess I should explain what campaigners is though first. Campaigners is a more in depth version of club. We talk more about Jesus and read some bible verses, for the most part it is for Christians but really doesn’t matter if you are or not. It’s more of a discussion group for everyone to get involved in. Now being campaigners meets on Monday nights that doesn’t allow for much time to prepare or contact kids if they need rides or anything. But that never seems to stop us from getting them out of their houses. Granted it did take me literally wrestling a kid and pinning him to the ground to convince him that he can sit at his computer and play videos anytime and this is a time for him to be social and if all else get out of the house. Overall though campaigners was a success, we had about 10 kids show up and for the most part all talked and gave some sort of an opinion to a question we presented them. Overall it was just good to see the kids having a desire to stay involved. 

Week 5 (7/8-7/14):

I’m so tired…….. camp drained every ounce of energy I had and then I spent the next three and a half days working on a video of all the pictures/videos we took for a picture party we had on Thursday. Needless to say I put a lot of time in this week staring at my computer. But I finished the video in time and the party was a success. We had a good chunk of our kids that went to camp come and we just talked/laughed at stories we shared with each other. Thankfully after Thursday I got a bit of a break and rested (took a couple naps throughout the days) and was able to catch up on life. Over all a successful week keeping in contact with camp kids. This week is crucial because camp life is so much different from at home for these kids and it might be hard for them to adjust back to it. 

Week 4 (7/1-7/7):

CAMP!!!!!!! This was by far one of the best weeks of my life. There is so much I can say that happened during this time but it would take way to long to type it all out on here. But I would be more than happy to talk to anyone about it whenever or on facebook or something and share how this week impacted the kids we brought to camp as well as myself. Young Life has got it down on how to give kids the best week of their lives and present the gospel to them with ease and no forcing the thought. So yeah I love talking about Young Life so just give me a holler and we’ll chat about it. Never know you might want be a Young Life leader next year. 

Week 3 (6/24-6/30):

This week was exhausting but camp is tomorrow wooooo! So pretty much this entire week I drove kids to different houses including mine to do yard work and miscellaneous jobs to raise as much money as possibly for Young Life Camp. The camp costs kids $600, which is a crazy high amount for a week of camp but God provided. I had one kid start fundraising with me this week and raised $550 dollars, that’s amazing! Along with others making a ton of money for camp as well. I’m pretty sure I was with kids everyday from around 9 to at least 2 or 3. Lots of time with them… but the best part about when we did yard work/fundraising, it gave me great opportunities to just talk with the kids and gain a little bit of trust from them. Making them feel more comfortable at camp when we go. Camp tomorrow!!

Week 2 (6/17-6/23):

With two weeks left before camp my main focus really should have been on figuring how much kids had left to pay and helped them fundraise as much as possible. But this week I pretty much just hung out with kid’s everyday. We went to see the movie Brave that was surprisingly in my opinion pretty good. I also hosted a game night at my house with kids and introduced them to the game Munchkins (which is possibly the best board game ever created FYI) and we played for almost 3 hours. I have a xbox kinect so kids love coming over and playing sports and dancing games. Overall the week was exhausting for me being with kids 24/7 but I wouldn’t trade it for anything I love being a Young Life leader!

Week 1 (All summer beforehand):

So even though we have to do blogs for 7 weeks I’m condensing everything before this week into it as well. Because I’m staying in DeLand all summer and doing Young Life stuff all summer. Major highlight I went to the high school the last week they had school luckily missed the very last day as they had a food fight and I would have had no idea what to do (join in or be the parental figure). I picked up some kids for a lock-in at the YL and my car died going up the hill on Pennsylvania right before Clara. So three of my YL kids and myself had to push my car uphill for about a mile or so to the YL house. I was without a car for about a month, which sucked trying to do contact work with kids. Other then that just got in the swing of things balancing two jobs on top of YL stuff but in the end I just lift it up to God cause I wouldn’t be able to do it without him. 

A Pollock Lesson (week 3)

At Fox Point we introduced our first official class by giving a Jackson Pollock lesson! We allowed the kids to completely be free with the paint by splattering it on their papers. We also gave them a small lesson about the famous artist. It was great, the younger kids seems a lot more engaged the older ones but it was a successful day nonetheless! 

Since we have a less structured program at Wanskuck we decided to do a bigger project with the kids! We spread a paper on the floor and had the kids splatter paint on it! It was awesome to witness their creativity and artistic freedom. It was a big collaboration project and they were very proud of it. 

This is a photo of Makayla, one of my favorite students at Wanskuck, she's a sweet heart and we love hanging out! She's very giggly too

I wanted to share one of my favorite coffee shops in Providence, it's called "Blue State Coffee" I arrive about an hour before going to work just so I can have breakfast here. It's delicious and all the food is organic and locally grown

Another awesome thing I got to do here was attend my first baseball game. It was a pawsox game and I'll be honest and say it was a little long and boring but it was still exciting to be part of such an Northern "New England" culture! 

Darina-7

            Unfortunately, I did not get to complete the distribution partner outreach project that I’ve been working on; however, I did leave my boss with enough and am sure that the organization will soon establish a partnership with some of the churches I’ve contacted. 

During my last two weeks in DC, I got the opportunity to be involved with Beacon House Summer program. Beacon House is “a non-profit, community based organization that provides tutoring, mentoring, cultural, athletic, recreational and nutritional programs to at-risk children, ages 5-18.” I worked in a classroom of children that were about 9 years old. My first day felt very awkward (as I always do around children). I hung back a lot of the time and really had a difficult time approaching the kids as they engaged in computer games and Lego-building. By the third visit I was familiar with most of the kids and did not feel as stiff and uncomfortable. A very shy girl, Kayla, and a rather outgoing boy Michael became particularly fond of me and would always ask to be my partners when we went on field trips or to the park (we have a buddy system that keeps the kids together when they walk). Something that was new to me is seeing the kids are like one big family—well some of them are actually cousins but that’s not what I mean when I say this. They sometimes argue and they sometimes fight, but they all know where the other lives and are always cracking jokes and inviting each other to play. Such a happy and carefree community which makes me want to be a kid again.

Courtney- Week 7

So much going on. I have a bunch of pots in a bunch of different fires. All's quiet on the summer camp front, orientation is quickly coming together, and I have two amazing mentees. 

Orientation:
Welcome and info emails have gone out to our 25 incoming Bonners! Welcome bags are assembled, the booklet is slowly (and I mean very slowly) coming together, and most of the guest speakers have been booked! We are eagerly awaiting their arrival come August 15th!

Mentor:
First mentee- We went downtown to the new frozen yogurt place. It was fantastic. I am no stranger to the self-serve fro yo joints but this one is a bit expensive at .46 cents an ounce. My sweet mentee wanted to try ALL THE FLAVORS and suddenly her cup was filled with fro yo and toppings... it all totaled out to about $9 just for her snack. Awesome time though and she really enjoyed it so that's all that matters. I set us up an appointment to go horse back riding on the 11th before school starts up and we're going to see The Dark Knight Rises on Friday.  I am going to have to take some special classes to learn how to work with her but I know how much she loves having a mentor so I'm willing to do it. Also, the home says that she asks about me everyday and talks about her "best friend Courtney".

Second mentee- I picked her up and we went school shopping one day. As she's getting in the car, she told me that her cousin was really jealous that I was picking her up. We decided to do our school shopping, go home and pack up her goodies then get her cousin and go to the baseball game. We spent a lot of money school shopping... but she has everything she needs and a brand new backpack! I have never seen a child so excited over a backpack. Her cousin was very quiet, but he was really happy to be included and going to a game. The Suns lost :( but we had an awesome time!

That's about it here. I'm done with my hours! I will update about the end to this week on Friday :)