SOCO
Objective
At the Society for Community Organization (SOCO), the possibilities were endless. My goal was to teach the young kids, aged 5-12, English in a one and a half hour session. For the first few weeks, I volunteered around three days a week, and I would observe other volunteers and how they would interact with the children. During this time, I also got to know everyone there, including the workers and the children. Once I caught the gist of everything, I spent two days teaching the children, and each session was around one and a half hours. I grew to find the place like a second home, since the children and the other workers were so welcoming, and they were like a large family. When summer ended, I still managed to devote a day of each week to help the children with their homework after school.
Process
On my first few trips to the organization center, I observed the children and understood their needs in the English subject. Day by day, I got a general grasp of their English standard and I had an understanding on what they needed help on. Since the age range of the class was from 6-12, and it was gender neutral, I didn’t want to focus on a topic that was stereotypically for a certain age or gender. I decided that over the two lessons I would be teaching, I could focus on teaching them about food and restaurant etiquette, as it would benefit all of them in daily life.
For both lessons, I prepared a PowerPoint to teach to the class, since most children tend to learn better visually. In the PowerPoint, I made sure to include Chinese translations and related pictures that were drawn by me to help their understanding of the content.
I started off the lessons with a simple game, like Pictionary or “say the color of the word”, to get the kids interactive and enthusiastic. Within the first lesson, I managed to teach them about different categories of taste and foods that fit into those categories, and also appropriate etiquette and behavior at a restaurant. The following lesson, I delved deeper into the topic of food, and I annotated a simple recipe for pizza with the children. Then they completed a worksheet I designed by drawing out their own pizzas, and there were many creative and colorful creations from them.
Reflection
After the two lessons, I noticed that the children were all very enthusiastic in participating in English activities, and that they would all use English vocabulary in their speech more confidently. If they weren’t sure about the spelling or a pronunciation of a word, they wouldn’t hesitate to inquire about it, and they were all very attentive in class. I hope that they will take the English knowledge and vocabulary they have retained and use it in their daily life, and they would not hesitate to speak more English with their peers and the people around them.
Diary Entry from My First Day
Today was my first day of official volunteering work. I walked into the room and, just like last time, the children were already huddled around tables. Today, they were all gathered together to play board games like Pokemon Monopoly.
A group of around four children invited me to be their “bank” for their Monopoly game. My job was to hand them their money and exchange it if they needed to. I was surprised by how quickly they could count their money and hand it in to me. An interesting thing from their game was their way of playing. When a player landed on a spot they didn’t want to buy, the others would bid on it, and the highest bid could therefore inherit the land. Even though it was a little unreasonable, since they ended up paying $600 for a $260 spot, I still found it quite amusing.
Soon after, they were told to pack up their games and to store them away, which they managed to do efficiently. Another group of four volunteers walked in with bags of fresh board games to play, which the children gladly agreed to. However, the group of boys were foreigners and couldn’t speak Cantonese, which the children were native to. I went around the room to help out with the groups of children and volunteers, helping them translate and communicate.
Even though the children there were polite and respectful, some fights and mishaps were still bound to occur. Two girls were snatching things from each other and being rough, and before I could put a stop to it, the younger girl burst into tears. I tried my best to comfort her and offer her tissues and a cup of water, and soon they had made up and were playing joyfully again.
At around lunchtime, the children ordered their food from another worker there, while others provided their own from home. They independently cut up plastic table cloth and laid it out neatly, sitting down to quietly wait for their lunch. Before eating, they also chorused “enjoy” to the volunteers and workers.
I’d say my first day was successful and I am off to a good start. The children were all well behaved and calm, whereas their fights were nothing but a storm in a teacup. I can’t wait to see what this commitment brings me next.