First Day Impressions

Today was my first day working at Balboa City School, and it was a pretty fun day. I arrived at 8:25, and visited my mentor, Andrew Fletcher, the school's student counselor. He had typed up a tutoring schedule for the week for me to follow. Everyday I would tutor a 2nd grader named Seth in 2nd and 4th period, and in 6th and 7th I would help in Laura's class. In the open periods, I was available for anything the rest of the faculty members asked me. In first period I talked with Buffy, the high school's English teacher, who promptly sent me to make some copies of tests for her. Though copying papers may seem like a tedious task, I actually found it pretty fun with all the whirring and beeping and whatnot. When I brought the papers back, she gave me a stack of Of Mice and Men books so I could number the chapters. I quickly finished that, and headed down to the lower school to help tutor Seth. Seth is a rather unruly kid, and is surprisingly rude and defiant to his teacher. Math isn't his strong suit, and is far behind in that subject, which is why I was asked to help. We were able to get through the period with very few problems, and we managed to finish his division classwork, and homework. I think that having someone that isn't and adult helping him with his work is a very good thing. After that, I helped graded some assignments for teachers, which was incredibly tedious. This teacher is assuming I'll be available for her everyday to grade her assignments, which I really, really do not want to do. I want to do something productive, rather than just do the work that the teachers don't want to do. After grading, I returned back to tutor Seth in reading, but everyone was discussing the schools mission statement and talking on how to be a good learner. Lunch came next, I talked with some students and a few teachers and then moved on to tutoring some more kids. The teacher I was assigned to help during 6th and 7th period was gone, so I just tagged along with the P.E. teacher. We walked up to the outskirts of Balboa Park and played a bit of soccer.

Over all, I really like this school and the environment. I respect the goals this school has in helping disabled children to succeed. In order to work here effectively I believe that you must be extremely patient and benevolent towards these kids, and it seems like it would be a very tough job. I'm very excited to work here for the next month.