The BJM after school program has made me realize how creative our minds are as children. From playing pretend to dressing up and holding a suspense of disbelief, these are things I feel that I’ve let go as I have gotten older. During this week’s service, I got to experience it again as I joined some children in making things with play-doh. There were some cookie cutters they used with the play-doh to pretend to have baked cookies. Then they went around having me “taste” all their assortment of desserts. This made me reminisce of times I would use items around my house when playing I substitute for other things.

As I walked over into the math and science room on my last day of volunteering, I sat down with some of the students who were playing connect four. As we started playing they all told me that I was playing it wrong and had lost. I was so surprised as I knew no other way to play connect four. They showed me all of the versions of the game they had come up with and exactly how to play. Given that connect four is a classic game, I was beyond surprised to see all of the variations and rules they had created. I was so glad to see them having a good time and creating the rules as they went on and laughing at the things they were not sure about.

Sometimes it is so easy to assume and think that certain things can only be done a certain way; however, so many of the rules and norms we blindly follow are far from concrete and are not permanent in any sense. Often when we find the courage to act beyond these rules we end up not only being our truest selves but also the happiest. We are told so often to think outside of the box or to be creative to stand out amongst our peers; however, we often try to accomplish this within the constraint of everyday rules and norms we simply are not taught to think beyond. Watching the children play and laugh as they redefined their own rules was nothing short of admirable and caused me to reflect on so many of the things I do simply because I have been taught to.

With my newfound cat caring confidence, all their tails were mine. I went around playing with each cat, but to show not only my confidence but also dominance, I light pet and grabbed every tail insight. Some liked the tail grabs while others thought it was an initiation to play fight; however, for me, the tail grab was my declaration of confidence. I had finally gotten used to my Tuesday home at the SPCA.

After 5 weeks, I have figured out that the room in the back of the cat wing is my favorite room. There are three small cats, and they are all very shy, but as I spend more time with them, they become more and more friendly. At first, they were very reluctant to play with their toys in front of me, but now they seem to go about their business as they would if I wasn’t in the room. I also noticed that the SPCA has a pretty good reggae playlist with a bunch of Bob Marley and Jimmy Cliff songs that they play in the rooms at night.

It is amazing how much joy a few cats can bring! Last night was my final night of volunteering at the SPCA this semester, and unfortunately I had an in-class final immediately beforehand. I was feeling a bit wiped out from the combination of final assignments due and of this exam. A lot of the cats were either high-energy or nervous, so at first I was a bit disappointed that I wouldn’t end up with a cat in my lap.

However, I ended up really enjoying playing with cats, even if they wouldn’t approach me. I think there is a perception that cats are more serious, irritable animals because they are constantly compared to dogs. But playing with and even just observing cats last night, I saw a lot of really silly behavior that made me laugh. (See attached photo). Oddly enough, I think this connects to my own identity. I think others probably perceive me as serious or unfriendly sometimes, because I tend to be a bit shy and bad at starting conversations with someone I just met. In reality, I am always looking to have fun and make friends. I feel a bit of relief when another person is good at making conversation, because it means I can participate without coming up with small talk topics! Maybe this relation is part of what makes me appreciate cats so much.

Overall, this has been a great semester with the cats. I really enjoyed my time at the SPCA, both working with the cats and getting to know my peers.

Last week during my visit to BJM, I spent my afternoon coloring in the Arts room. I had a pretty rough week with a jam-packed Tuesday and so spending the hour chatting and playing with the kids was absolutely wonderful. I had just drunk a warm cup of coffee from the Starbucks on Seneca and the pretty Christmas cup (empty by now) that I had with me was almost immediately decorated with colorful stickers by the sweet girls I was sitting with. I, of course, could no longer throw it away!

I started coloring with one of my favorite little girls, who has the liveliest personality and says the funniest little things. She’s quite talented at drawing and for the most part I was just sitting next to her and supervising as all of the girls drew. After a while, she told me I should start drawing as well and I asked what she would like me to do– so she drew me what I thought was a random creation of lines and shapes, though she assured me that  it was a mouse. I began coloring the mouse in, but every time I used a certain color to fill in a certain part, she urged me to use a different color and would hand it to me. I would just smile and do as she said for it was quite the fun following her instructions. Finally, our curious creation was covered by every color in the rainbow– Mr. Rainbow Mouse we named him. At this point we were both laughing and filling in the picture with curious details, such as a top hat and a suitcase. She began teasing by saying that she would fix the picture and then drew a line through it. I, of course, played along and repeatedly kept pulling the picture away as she made attempt after attempt at covering him with scribbles. Alas, my efforts were to no avail for Mr. Rainbow Mouse met his doom at the end of a red and black marker.

As the semester comes to an end and weeks become busier as finals come around, it’s always nice to have a safe and cozy place full of friendship and laughter to turn to. Every visit at BJM is a unique experience and every afternoon is a gift. The lovely souls, every single one, at BJM teach me something every time I see them, they bring me joy, and they encourage me. I am forever grateful to them.

One of the cats I socialized on this last visit was recovering from a recent ear surgery. This made it so that her head was slightly cocked, but she still really liked pets. After interacting with her, I was wondering about why she had to undergo ear surgery since this information was not shared on her information sheet. I looked into this and found that ear surgery in cats is most commonly performed to treat otitis media with polyp formation on the middle ear. Otitis media is a group of inflammatory diseases (infections) that affect the middle ear. The middle ear contains the ear drum which vibrates due to incoming sound and small bones that transmit these vibrations to the inner ear. A polyp is an abnormal tissue growth or tumor. Since cats normally have an acute sense of hearing, this ear disorder can be painful. If this is what she had, I am glad that it is getting resolved and I hope she has a speedy recovery!

This week, I was in the Math and Science room.

I sat down at a table with two girls and one boy. The two girls were playing this game where we had to try to fill the board with colored pieces (similar to tetris pieces) but there weren’t enough pieces, so they just tried to fill one side. Calvin was quietly watching but wanted to join, so I asked the two girls if Calvin and I could join. They agreed, but after one round, they left to play another game. Calvin became more talkative and said that he wanted to play a game that he was sure he could beat me every time because he’s very good at it. He meant Connect 4. Haha. I saw ways to win, but I let him win rounds and even pointed out what he could do to win, to which he responded with “I saw it before you pointed it out!” He then said “Let’s play but we each get 4 turns. I’ll go first!” He promptly puts in 4 pieces in a row.

He then pulls out a chess board with insufficient checker pieces. Calvin wanted me to play chess with him, but we didn’t have enough pieces nor the right pieces; we played anyway. We essentially played checkers, but the pieces moved differently. It showed me that kids don’t care about rules and winning (only sometimes though), but rather they just want to play and interact with others. As an only child, I didn’t really have others to play with; my parents did not understand much English, so explaining the rules to them was difficult. Maybe I should’ve just made up my own rules so I could play with them.

On my 5th week volunteering, I felt pretty used to the set up of the shelter and went room to room, greeting the cats I had seen before and playing with and petting new cats. There were a few new kittens that were very rowdy. They didn’t really pay attention to me, as they could easily entertain themselves by rolling around and pouncing at each other. They had short attention spans and would soon get distracted when I tried playing with them, and so I simply sat and enjoyed the show of their play-fights for a while. Watching them reminded me of my two cats, who are very serious and graceful at times, while still kittens at other times, with mock-fights and chases.

In one of the rooms, I met a very friendly black kitten that seemed to be pretty skinny, with a slim body and thin tail. When he was walking around me, he would keep looping back for more pets and would rub his whole head against me. After pacing for a while, he stepped onto my lap and quickly settled down for a nap. Whenever I would accidentally move or shift, he would look up at me with wide eyes. I felt that his eyes were very intelligent and full of energy and his gaze seemed to communicate his curiosity. I enjoyed spending time with him because of his liveliness and friendliness.

On 11/21/19 I went to BJM to volunteer and had to take care of 5 third graders.

This was a tough experience because two of them needed to get work done, but the other three were being very distracted. It was pretty difficult getting the other three to be quiet and still be able to help the other two students. I ended up having to trick the other 3 into studying and behaving so that I could help the other two with their work. I told the other three to play more quiet games, such as hangman, and kept them entertained.

From this experience, I learned the importance of keeping everyone involved regardless of what situation. It is important to always keep the entire group involved when in a group situation, so that no one can be detrimental to the group and is able to provide more to the group. When organizing a group, it is important to make sure everyone’s opinions are accounted for so that no one feels left out and so that the group is more cohesive.

On November 20, I volunteered at BJM Elementary School. I was stressed about my prelim the next day and was looking forward to my volunteer session as a form to destress. When I arrived, I was once again assigned to volunteer at the science room. At the science room, I played board games with the little children and helped with the other children in the arts and crafts section. During a round of Candy Land, one student in particular was upset about losing. In response, I tried comforting the little girl by reminding her that it was okay to lose. Losing does not mean that the world is over. In fact, I believe losing or experiencing failure is an opportunity for one to redeem themselves. I suggested playing another round of Candy Land so that the little girl can not only redeem herself, but also remind her that it is important to never give up. After playing another round of Candy Land (which the little girl ended up winning), I realized that I should take the advice I had given to the little girl in my own life. For example, whenever I don’t do well on an exam, I should not view that as a failure. Instead, I should find ways to do even better on the next exam and remind myself that I can only grow as a person by learning to accept and acknowledge failures and how to recover.

This week at BJM, I volunteered in the Arts and Sciences room. I noticed a child that was just sitting on a stool and looking around the room and I immediately went to him and asked him if he wanted to do something. He immediately jumped up and led me to some blocks. I thought we would be building some obstacle course but to my surprise, we simply built an incredibly tall (and unsteady) tower of blocks and all he wanted to do was just knock it over. Following this, we played Connect 4, which I taught him how to play and then we stopped playing once he won. The next game we played was Candy Land, which, ironically, he taught me how to play. This game proved to be incredibly unpredictable and very distressing as a randomly picked card could decide whether we moved forwards or backwards. Many times it happened that when one of us was reaching the end, we were propelled back to the beginning. Nearing the end of the hour, we made one last block tower and he knocked it over. I learned that kids are willing to play with anyone but some are just really shy. By approaching him, I had allowed him to really enjoy the hour with someone. I also really found his approach to building tall towers and then watching them make a loud thud when knocked over quite interesting. I think it shows his commitment and strong work ethic in order to achieve a desired goal.

Madaline asked me to help her with her math homework to which I gladly accepted. Seeing that she only completed two of the conversions, I tried to remember what method my elementary school teacher taught us to make conversions and immediately a lightbulb went off. I decided to teach Madaline the King Henry Doesn’t Usually Drink Chocolate Milk (KHDUDCM) acronym where the first letter of each word represented a type of meter and “usually” represented the standard unit of meter. I wrote out the first letters of each word in the acronym on top and wrote the number from the third question under the K column on Madaline’s notebook. I walked Madaline through the steps and explained to her the process for each question, and Madaline seemed to understand as she nodded and showed focus when she answered my questions correctly on the number of zeros and decimal places. Madaline’s confidence in working through the questions shined brightly, and I think the main reason was due to her understanding of making conversions and using a simple strategy to get the answers. I smiled at the thought of teaching a strategy that I found useful to me to a young student because I felt that my small help allowed her to make sense out of what she learned in class. This made me realize that tutors and teachers most likely feel an internal source of reward when they see students understand the material and work through the problems.

Today at BJM I was cleaning up after second choice when I was approached by a second grader. He asked if he could help me finish a puzzle I had been working on. We were a great team, and completed three puzzles over the course of the hour. With the first two 100-piece puzzles, we were frustrated that one piece was missing both times. Finally, on the last puzzle, we finally found one that had all of the pieces and were able to successfully and fully finish a puzzle.

I was surprised at how vocal this second grader was, as a young student I would not have approached an older student (even though he thought I was 16) and would definitely not prompt conversation while completing an activity. With programs like A+ that allow interactions between college and elementary students, it makes it easier for college age students to be approached by younger students.

Today at BJM I helped a few fifth grade students with their math homework. They were learning how to round, so I had them practice counting by tens and explained how they would round up or down to a multiple of ten based on which was closer to the number they were given. They were brand-new at the concept but learned quickly, and the practice problems on their homework definitely helped.

This week at BJM was fun since I worked with students I hadn’t previously met before and I was impressed with their desire to help one another. One of the fifth graders, after having completed her homework, stepped in when I was helping another student with her homework and said she wanted to help her instead of me. These students were very motivated to get their work done and I was impressed by their ability to focus on their schoolwork despite their loud surroundings.