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Vanessa Rosales
Henry
Service Learning Per 4
Due: 11 December 2014
Service Learning Project
Markham is an elementary school located on Brown St. and Markham
Ave. Markham has been a school for many years and has slowly became
culturally diverse. They have adopted the bilingual program, which teaches
the students Spanish as a second language once they start in a kindergarten.
Markham at one point was only an English language school. But overtime as
the population of Hispanic communities grew; the school adapted and added
the Spanish immersion program. This program teaches students another
language at a young age and also enlightens them with another culture.
I chose Markham as my service learning location because I have close
ties with the teachers and students there. I knew that Markham also
welcomed visitors and volunteers, and had events that required much help.
At first, I wanted to find a specific problem that I could help, maybe find a
solution. But is I helped, I just realized how any bit would help would be great
to do, whether it solved a specific problem, or not. Another reason that
brought me to Markham was my past experiences as a child there. I
remembered older students that would also help and visit their teachers. I

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remember how much I looked up to the people that were so kind in helping
everyone. So I suppose, my thoughts from a child influenced me to want to
create an image that children could look up to, so that could maybe influence
their future so they can possibly think of doing the same.
At Markham, I helped third grade teacher, Norma Guerrero for the most
part. I would help grade papers and talk about the students average score
with her, copy and print work packets, help students in their work, or projects
in class, read things aloud, and help fundraise for the class. Copying and
printing could speak for itself, I learned how to use the massive printing
machines to make copies of mathematics, science, and language
worksheets, along with cultural readings for certain holidays and tests.
Sometimes I would be assigned to make name tags or little forms to fill out
for lost books at home and to print them out. Grading work also speaks for
itself, where I grade the work, if it seems that the class didnt do too well on
similar things, I would mention it to Mrs. Guerrero so she would be able to
see what to do. In class, I would walk around and help students in certain
projects that they would work on and usually in math when they are not able
to grasp certain concepts. Sometimes I would be sent to go to another
teacher and help her students in first grade math. There, I would help the
students work on the more simple concepts in math, but in Spanish. More inclass projects would be helping with art projects. Along with other in-class
things, I would help write out posters and put them up. Things that took
place out of class were for fundraisers. In November, there was a cultural

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exposition/fundraiser by the whole school for Da De Los Muertos or Day of
the Dead. That day I helped make posters to promote the games and sell the
food, pick-up 10 pizzas boxes for the people attending, help distribute them,
then also play lotera (Mexican bingo) with the kids. Another fundraiser was
making popcorn to raise money for the class specifically. In all my
experiences I learned how to open myself to conversation more with others
and to get over "embarrassment" because being a bit more creative with the
kids can really help them learn or pay attention to something.
According to what was given to me in the Supervisor Evaluation sheet
came to be very positive. Looking the sheet over allows me to see how I can
see how I have improved. Generally, some of the things mentioned like
flexibility, I would see as something natural to me, but it seems that it's
something that's really appreciated. I generally agreed with the evaluations.
On my own personal review/ reflection, I believe that I should have spoken
up more in asking questions in how to do things, though I did get better
about doing so after a while of volunteering there.
From all of the personality evaluations, I've seen that I am not very
open to conversation and tend to stay quiet, yet, passionate. By knowing my
personality I could analyze my own reactions and see how I could react in
certain situations, or know how to place myself correctly in a place where I
may feel most comfortable, or where I could step out of my comfort area to
grow. In volunteering, I saw how my personality lead me to immediately go

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to a service site that I had known or felt comfortable. In work, I generally was
quiet and did what I had to do. With students, I would have to speak up
more, yet even then I had kept quiet unless it was absolutely necessary to
speak. The only area where I was not absolutely shy was playing lotera at
the Day of the Dead Festival where I called out and explained them to nonSpanish speakers. From my volunteer experience I learned how to speak up
more when needed, how to speak with adults and children, and how to use
several different types of printing devices.
Volunteering at Markham was always something that I loved to do, so
choosing that site was something that was pleasant. I've known the
students, teachers and generally the school long enough to feel comfortable.
Specifically at the site I remembered how important it was to learn Spanish,
because it is used widely in the school and community. Doing the service
learning project was a great experience, so I will do this again, though I will
hope to do more help with the students. I would choose the same spot,
though I think it would be a great idea to switch location for my own personal
growth. Either way I would want to help the students, though, I would have
to communicate more with a teacher or staff that I did not personally know
before. While planning my service learning project, I had Markham as my
first opportunity. Of course when time ran short and I had no other ideas, I
gladly went to Markham, as I had planned. My time at Markham started
slowly but as the end of the hours came closer, I was rushed into cramming
Markham events to get my forty hours done. I thought from the beginning

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that I was on time with all of the hours, but I realized that I didnt allow times
for days that I was unacceptably busy, and unable to go to Markham. I
realized that it was important to plan before hand, to make sure that I
wouldnt have many problems in the future with rushing my hours. In the end
I didnt plan for breaks and had a very busy schedule. I would have been
better if I had started my hours earlier. I believe that I the beginning it was
difficult learning how to use the office technologies and understand how to
help students in things that seem rudimentary to me. This volunteering
experience showed me part of what it was to be a teacher and further my
knowledge in a career that I would like to pursue in my future. I certainly
learned that being a teacher is not an easy job: one is constantly on their
feet, keeping an eye on time and searching for ways to engage students.
This I believe was a great learning experience and certainly opened my mind
to different understandings.
This next section is a group of photos that I took during service
learning. I did not take any photos of the students because of the problems
that could arise with the parents.

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Here we are at the Pizza and

Lotera tables at the Da de los
Muertos. We made the posters
that surrounded us.

Here is the outdoors section

of the school. These classes
have a variety of age
groups, students, and
subjects.

Here is a dance that the

students did during the
event. The overall dance
form is called "Ballet
Folklorico".

During another dance, I lost

my whole lotera audience.
The second dance is called
"La danza de los viejitos"
which would be " the dance
of the old folks".

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This area was where we

played lotera with students
and guardians. Next to this
table was where we served
visitors pizza .