PROJECT HOPE!

       Project Hope is a building in which there is a homeless shelter for women; there is a portion of the building that is a preschool for children of ages zero months to five years old. The preschool has a main play room for the older children and a smaller room for the toddlers and babies. In the room there are a multitude of objects to play with; these include the block area, the painting easels, and the elevated dramatic play area. The main play room is where the corps members have session and class room assistance time. Session planning occurs after session in a room directly below the main play room, which is used when the children cannot go outside because of the weather.

When we arrive for session the children are just waking up from nap. Some of them see the Jumpstart shirts and start folding up their mats right away, while a select few have taken the phrase “sleeping like a log” to a whole new level. Once we rouse all of the children they head to snack and we sit with them while they eat. Corps members are always offered snacks after the children have received servings first. Usually each corps member tries to sit with their partner children; mine all sit at the same table by themselves, so I get to join them and check up to see how they are doing. Each child finishes snack at different times (my partner children usually go for seconds) so name cards are started at different times, but everyone usually looks around at the others to see when to start reading the book for that day. From there, the rest of the session plan is implemented and everything runs smoothly, unless the children did not get to go outside that day and are a little more rambunctious and distractible then usual. During center time everyone helps out one another; for example, if a corps member notices there is a large number of children in a center that they are not in charge of and they have no children in their particular center, they will move to help out their fellow corps member, while still making sure that if any children want to go to the corps member’s activity he or she is ready to mobilize.

The feel of the group is very nice and has no butting personalities or cliques. All of the teachers are happy to have us in their preschool and it is fun working with them as well. Session planning can sometimes be hard to focus on because people may be tired from the day. It is interesting to watch the change in corps members after session because they know that once they walk out of jumpstart session they do not have to keep their enthusiastic face on anymore. We try to keep our energy for session review and planning up and our complaints about the long trip home down. We are looking forward to our family event because a little less than half of the children get picked up by bus drivers, so we have not met all the parents yet. All in all, it has been a pleasant experience at project hope.

Ian Driscoll