The first week back at the SPCA was bittersweet. A lot of the relationships I made with the kittens were severed; however, a lot of them were adopted into good homes, so I am grateful! Although, Fiona was still at the shelter so I continued to socialize her. Working out the cat shelter during the previous semester has made me very confident and more relaxed with animals so this semester was not as difficult.  I can understand and socialize with the cats much easier now and they don’t seem as afraid to interact as before. Hopefully, by building up my animal experience I can convince my parents to get a pet too!

I’ve been volunteering at BJM since my first semester at Cornell, which was four semesters ago. It’s crazy how much time has gone by. It might seem cliche, but it really does feel like I just met Mrs. Stacy and the rest of the BJM gang yesterday. My first day volunteering at BJM this year was as heartening as most of my visits are. I got to sit down to catch up with Mrs. Stacy who I had missed a lot over the break. It’s nice to wind down after a long day and get to talk so leisurely and comfortably with someone who shares some of the same passions as me. I missed Mrs. Patel who was out for sometime because of an injury. But, Mrs. Sarah was there to cheer me up and laugh with me as we colored with the kids. As visits have come and gone, I’ve found that some days are busier than others, when the kids have a lot of energy and they want all of your attention, while on those others, they tend to play and work on their own, only coming up to you to talk occasionally. I enjoy this constant change. Every visit is a new experience, even on the slowest days. As someone who wants to be a teacher in the future, this is a comfort and something that excites me. Days will be challenging, some may be boring, others may be great. But everyday will be a new adventure, no matter how similar it might look to previous days.

My first week back at BJM, I worked with two boys on their homework.

I helped Samuel with his English homework. He was very determined to get it all done because he wanted to play when he was home. He had to make alliterations. He spoke Spanish at home and Spanish seemed to be his primary language, so helping him come up with alliterations was a little difficult. It reminded me of my summer job where I helped young Korean students with English grammar. Nonetheless, it was really fun and I even got to speak a little bit of Spanish with him.

I also helped Elijah with his math homework. He was fooling around for a while, saying that he knew how to do it all and could do it later. To which, I responded, “Doesn’t that mean you can finish it quickly now, so you can play and worry about it later?” He ignored me saying that he can just do it at home, and he wanted to play with his friends now. Even though I gave him that advice, I realize that sometimes I don’t even follow that logic. It made me realize how much of an “instant-gratification monkey” I had inside me. haha.

My first week back to BJM this semester was very exciting. I was glad to see the same friendly faces and see what the students were up to this time. Upon entering the Arts and Sciences room, I was surprised to see that there was a legitimate Beyblade battle going on. Not only did they have the spinning tops and rippers, but also a stadium that had been handmade. Unfortunately, things got a bit competitive and someone did not want to share and give another kid a turn, so an argument broke out. Fortunately, though, the students were able to settle their differences by themselves and continue playing and sharing. 

From this experience, I was surprised to see the level of maturity the students showed here. Although they were frustrated with another for a bit, they realized that they were classmates and friends, so they were able to move on before anything really escalated. I believe it is great they are showing skills like this early on.

It was nice to be back at BJM Elementary School and to see the children again. Unlike my pervious volunteer sessions, Ms. Stacey had assigned me to help out in the gym rather than the usual math and science room. When I arrived in the gym, the kids were getting ready to play capture the flag. The kids took the initiative to divide themselves into two teams and had already set the game up by placing flags on opposite sides of the gymnasium. I was impressed by how quick and well organized the kids were in splitting themselves into two teams in contrast to how long my classmates and I use to take back in my elementary school days. The kids played the first round of capture the flag and worked well cooperatively: each member has a specific person to defend while the goalie of each team protects the flag. After the two rounds, both teams have won once and shook hands with one another, showing great sportsmanship.

Witnessing the kids’ great cooperation and sportsmanship made me reflect on how I can be a better team player in my own life. For example, in group projects, I tend to take a long time in responding to my group’s group chat. I can improve on being a better communicator by replying to group messages more quickly and updating my progress on the work I have done. Seeing how everyone needs to work cooperatively and responsibly has inspired me to be a better team player.

In week 1 of volunteering at BJM in the spring semester, I was tasked with helping two third graders with their math homework. They were doing simple multiplication and division problems. But both were having a lot of difficulty. When helping them, I noticed pretty soon that the work wasn’t all that difficult for them, but they were just having difficulty starting the homework. When I got them to do the first couple of problems, they did it very easily. However, they immediately lost motivation to finish work and just wanted to play games. This was a classic case of procrastination that college students do all the time. Rather than finish the work now, we would rather have fun now and do the work later. However, this situation made me wonder if learning is fun. I used to think learning was fun as a child because I remember school being fun. The two students I was teaching seemed to hate learning, but I wasn’t sure if that was just because they didn’t like math. Nonetheless, I think learning can be fun, as long as it is not extremely difficult. When the difficulty levels of learning become harder and harder, our motivation weakens and makes us think learning new stuff is boring. It was funny to see how quickly students’ opinions change towards learning, as both of the third graders immediately got excited to learn art right after finishing their homework.

The first week I resumed volunteering at BJM I was asked to help out in the gym. Although I love interacting with the kids, I had only done so in an academic setting or help out with arts and crafts in the art room- the gym was new territory. I was nervous about helping out as I was completely unsure of what I would have to do if a conflict occurred or even how to make sure everyone was staying engaged. Once I entered the gym everyone was trying to decide what game to play and soon we went through several games with everyone screaming what they wanted to do next. I noticed, however, one of the students was sitting out as she was unable to physically engage in many of the activities most students wanted to play. I walked over and asked her what she wanted to do and she wanted to play basketball. We made a few attempts to play with the normal net; however, that was not working and I could tell that she was getting visibly upset with each failed attempt, and then I suggested we just create our net. We found an extra net in the supply room and created a lower one that made it easier to play from her wheelchair, and we ended up playing and laughing until she was picked up around 5 PM. The time I spent in the gym not only ended up being the most fun but it was also the most memorable, as I was able to interact with the students in a completely different yet fun setting.

There were very few cats at the SPCA on February 4th. While this is good because it means the cats being brought in are finding homes, it tends to make me feel like my shift is somewhat useless. When there are so few cats, they have surely been getting lots of attention throughout the day and are more likely to want some alone time than some affection. After visiting a few cats, I settled into a room with a cat that didn’t seem to mind my presence. I planned on lightly petting this cat while doing schoolwork. But after about 15 minutes, the cat crawled into my lap and began purring!

This made me realize that sometimes a bit of extra time to get to know the cats is exactly what they need.

Today I went to the Game Room. After playing Scramble, two students and I decided to play Frozen themed Monopoly. Although there were many missing pieces and unknown directions between the two students, we managed to construct playing pieces and a relatively correct set of directions.

What I found most interesting about this experience was the adaptation for the absence of having dice. Both students decided that me asking math problems to them was a smarter way of playing the game. So, for a kindergartner, I asked addition problems, and for the third grader, I asked basic multiplication problems. Thankfully, both kids were able to have a great time playing the game while doing math!

I do not remember having so much fun playing UNO cards with an elementary school student before. His name is Sam. His rule made me laugh uncontrollably and enjoy the present activity at the moment. The rule that Sam used was he would take a card from the deck and put that card down if it matched the color or number of the top card in the pile. I thought that was wrong because taking a card from the deck meant that the player had finished his or her turn and the next player would either put a card down or take a card from the deck. However, I did not tell him that he was wrong because I started to doubt my knowledge of the game’s rules. I ended up winning the first round, but we both were confused about how we played after multiple rounds. 

I returned to BJM elementary after having been on winter break. While I expected the kids to not immediately recognize me, I was not expecting them to completely forget who I am. Ms. Sarah and Ms. Stacy were delighted to see me and smiled and said hello. But when I turned to some of the kids they looked terrified that I knew their name. I understand that it has been a long time, and I hope to rebuild the relationship that I had with them.

Additionally, I didn’t realize how calming and soothing it is to be back at BJM. It reaffirmed for me that this place, and going there every week makes me a better person. Purely seeing the children makes me feel a million times better during a stressful time in my life.

I want to plan another project for the kids with Ms. Sarah. The snowflake project was one of the most special moments I have spent at BJM and I hope to rebuild that for the children, but also for myself.

My visit this past week was the first since last semester. It felt nice to get back into the shelter to see the cats again. When I went, all the cats from last semester were no longer there because they were adopted. I am glad that the cats were able to find a new home.

The current cats at shelter each had their own personalities. One cat that I was playing with seemed disinterested at first, but after some experimentation, I had found that the cat really liked a certain stick toy over the others. It was interesting to observe the preferences of the cats.