This I believe

I firmly believe Jumpstart widens your perspective and makes you think about your place in the world in a whole new way.

I’m right now fresh off my first “real” session (my first after the classroom observation). Even with all the training I had done, I was still worrying that things would go wrong before arriving at the school. Within minutes after showing up, my mindset changed. The kids were so excited to start, even going over name-cards was a fun time. All that excitement did made reading Oonga Boonga a little difficult....but hey, who can blame them? Jumpstart really does make these kid’s day. The excitement I saw on their faces made waking up at 7:30 a.m (the earliest I woke up in a long while..) and hustling over to the metro stop completely worth it. As the session moved on and center time began, I was again surprised by the sheer level of enthusiasm some of the students had for what I imagined in my head, to be boring activities. How fun could an alphabet puzzle be anyway right? Wrong. My small group of three were so thrilled to complete it that they were fighting over who could find the next letter! These kids made me realize just how truly exciting the little things in life could be. If only adults could appreciate and get so much out of what seem like every day activities like constructing a puzzle or matching letters of the alphabet.

After witnessing this reaction from the students, I could not help but realize the awesome role I played in these kids day. By facilitating the activities in Jumpstart I directly contributed to improving the student’s love of learning and general appreciation of life. Next time I roll over to hit the alarm in the morning, it won’t be so tough to get out of bed. 

~Joseph Shaw

Corps member

Team Dedication