I recently have started my Marquette Service Learning at the Highland Community School in Milwaukee. The Highland Community School is a Montessori school that educates children from ages 18 months to 11 years old. This is the first encounter that I have ever had with a Montessori school and I am finding it very interesting. Montessori schools educate students based on their individual desire to learn. Parent involvement is very large in this type of school, which allows for a very tight-knit community within the school. I have had the chance to volunteer at the school twice already, helping to supervise the after-school program.
The first time I volunteered, I got the chance to work with the 3 to 6 year old group while they played on the playground. I was able to observe the children and how they played together. One of the most interesting things about this first experience was interacting with the kids on a new professional level. The children knew that I was a new volunteer so many of them tried to test the rules with me. It was interesting to see which children would test how far they could push the rules before I told them what they were doing was not allowed. Even at such a young age these children fully understood the concept of right and wrong and also understood the fact that I, as a new volunteer, might not be aware of what exactly the children are and are not allowed to do. Of course, I knew that anything that could put a child in danger would not be allowed on a school playground, so when the children tried convincing me that they were allowed to stand on top of the jungle gym at the highest and most unstable point, I knew they were fooling me. At one point when some of the children picked up toy rakes from the sandbox to use as weapons, I surprised them by saying those were not allowed to leave the sandbox. They did not expect me to know this rule so they thought they would be able to get away with it. It was interesting to see each of their personalities come out through their playground play and observing them was a good way of getting to know them from afar.
On my second volunteer day, I worked with the older group of kids which were around the ages that would put them between 1st and 3rd grade. This day I got the chance to supervise them during their snack time and while they were completing a craft. For the craft, each child got a picture of leaves to color and then cut out and glue onto a giant drawing of a tree. They each got to add a little of their own creation to this tree which would be hung up in the school. It was interesting to see how some of the children enjoyed the craft more than others. I noticed how the two girls in the group took the coloring very seriously, while many, but not all, of the boys were not so careful. Some of the kids needed more help than others with the cutting but in the end all of the pictures represented a little bit of each child's personality. This experience really showed me how in any given group of children there is likely to be many differences in the interests and learning styles of each of them. It taught me how to interact with children on multiple different levels.
