Vacation Bible School

For my take action project I worked at Vacation Bible School at Holy Rosary.  What I did was run various stations, such as arts and crafts, story-telling, and games.  I worked this over a variety of days.  Not only was the purpose of the activity to give the kids a fun experience, it was to give the group leaders (mostly 5th-6th grade) a leadership role, and an opportunity to learn about that role.  I wound up handling a lot of the discipline issues with both the younger kids and the leaders, because I was able to handle the issues without yelling.  What I'm hoping, and the event organizer Emilie, hopes the main impact will be on the older kids, is that they learn how to be responsible leaders.  As this was her first year organizing the event, she was hesitant to use kids so young to be group leaders, however as the days went on she was able to see the progress they made in leadership, as was I.  When they started, many of them weren't ready for the task, but by the time we were finished, she was feeling a lot better about them as leaders.  I will be volunteering at this event in the future, and I also hope to institute similar leadership experiences into the classroom when I eventually become a teacher.  This all relates to our course, because it is teaching these kids a skill they can use to succeed during life.  As Emilie said, "Without leadership, this kids will survive.  With leadership, these kids will thrive."  Utilizing the leadership skill could gets these kids jobs, and then help them move forward in those jobs.  It could also teach them to take charge, and do things for themselves, instead of waiting for others to do it for them.