NIGHT ONE.
For my career day I got the opportunity to shadow my good friend Ashley M. at her job as a youth director for a church in my home city. I spent two nights watching her interact and lead bible study with a group of young kids. As a person who is looking for job experience that is helping the community of the environment, getting to see an example of such positions was very inspirational. I find it amazing how Ashley has the ability to get a large group of kids all focused on the bible with the help of volunteers and other directors. For the first night we had a much larger group of kids which allowed me to see how Ashley handles certain situations. I learned that there is a certain schedule that Ashley works around to allow the kids to get all their energy out before pulling out the bibles. The night started with the kids having free time for a few minutes. This allows the youth directors and volunteers to discuss the plans for bible study and the lesson that is going to be taught. Depending on the size or energy of the group they either go straight to bible study or all go down to the gym to play a few games. Because it was a larger group we all headed down stairs to the gym to play. We played kick ball and raced. After about twenty minutes we went straight upstairs and pulled the couches together where we could all sit. For the lesson I watched as Ashley got mostly every kid in the group to read and debrief what they read. I found it really cool how she allowed the kids to get rambunctious and then settle them down to talk about God’s message. The night ended and we walked all the kids out of the building to wait for their parents.
night two.
On the second night my original mentor was not there so I got to shadow another youth director. Greg just recently moved to the church and his wife is working a full time position there. This night was planned by one of the volunteers that Ashley trust to control the kids. This night was much smaller than the group the week before so it started with the two kids that we had playing for a few minutes as we learned the section of the bible and what we were trying going teach the children. The passage that we read spoke of treating others with the kindness that we wish to receive. One of the kids was having trouble understanding that even if he is nice there are going to be moments where people are not going to be nice in return. We spent most of the time breaking down that the passage meant just for this one kid and how he was struggling to understand. I found it very interesting how Greg and this volunteer worked together to teach this young kid. Once we had taken over the rest of the passage we took the children to the gymnasium where I got the chance to race with them as well as play the piano with them. Because It was such a small group it was hard to play any games, but they has no problem to adjusting to the circumstances. Once we had finished playing in the gym, we returned to the room to lock up and follow the kids down stairs to take them to their parents. It was an awesome experience to get to see the volunteers and leaders teach these kids and also me how religion can really help you throughout life. They are not forcing these kids to believe anything, but listen to ideas that we can relate to our everyday experiences.