BTU (826 Boston)
Creator: Jee Suh
This blogpost involves service done at BTU with 826 Boston as a part of a first-year writing course.
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Every time I go to the BTU, I feel like I have a different feeling about it just because of how different it is every single time I’ve been there. Taking the orange line to Forest Hills every Monday, going to the Boston Teachers Union School has now become a routine for me and my weekly mornings. To the start of this service learning, I was very reluctant and dreaded every single moment of it. I did not want to wake up early on Mondays and take the t to “tutor” these children when I felt very under qualified to do so. Now every single week is a lot more comfortable and I see myself enjoying my time there.
The first few times I went to the school, it was a lot similar to what I expected it to be. There were lots of children in a scattered environment, refusing to follow instructions and the teachers were easily ignored. Communicating with the children there was pretty difficult. As much as it was challenging for me to reach out to them, a lot of them also responded with uncooperativeness to follow instructions. The two and a half hours seemed like it took forever to pass by.
Now, things are completely different. I feel a lot more comfortable interacting with kids no matter what the activity may be. Sometimes we have to help them develop an analysis of a poem, sometimes we have to help them with drawings for an art. Sometimes we have to help them with writing related tasks and work with nouns and synonyms. What’s really cool about doing these activities is that while doing these things, it’s very easy to see what these kids are interested in. For example, a lot of these kids focused their work on fortnite, reflecting the interests of these group of kids.
Yesterday was a rather easy day just because there were no kids there. We would focus on our own work till someone came up to us and asked for help. It was a good day to get back into the cycle from spring break, but I also did miss the rush of interacting with young kids and the loud and vibrant atmospheres of these rooms. Although this will be probably different by next week, I enjoyed the quietness of the room and took advantage of the peacefulness and was able to finish some work of my own.
I am a little scared because I missed out on a few weeks worth of service learning due to different reasons. I probably need to make this up soon to make sure I am caught up with all of the required hours before this semester is over, but it is a little hard to do considering the fact that I have work every day. However, I do enjoy the whole purpose of service learnings and should try to make the most out of it with the remainder of this term.