This isn't said too often by me but I did something new from February through April. I was a volunteer teacher for Junior Achievement at West Liberty Elementary School.
West Liberty Public Library youth librarian Kelli Brommel recommended me. When the volunteer coordinator asked, I quickly said yes.
Every Wednesday, I taught Leighton Huston’s morning and afternoon classes about “Our Community.”
Huston is a teacher in the dual language program with Jose Cano, so the students would switch teachers around lunchtime. I had about 40 students who all had different personalities and were fun to teach.
The theme for the first lesson was communities at work.
A community map was hung up on the whiteboard. The students identified the different buildings on the map and who worked there.
Students learned about what made West Liberty unique such as West Liberty Foods, the Hispanic population and the dual language program the students were enrolled in. The kids in both classes were very eager to participate and all wanted to answer a question.
The second lesson was about people at work.
We spoke about the different types of jobs people have, whether or not they work where they live or commute, and how much education they needed to do that job.
At the end of the lesson, I asked what they wanted to do after high school.
Several students said they wanted to be hairstylists, teachers or a doctor or nurse. One student wanted to be a lab technician. Another said biologist.
The students also drew a map of what they would like their community to look like or include. Several students said they wanted more parks, better roads and a pool. Schools were also on the list but one student even mentioned having a hospital because their parent worked as a nurse in Iowa City.
The third lesson was money at work.
This was all about the cost of having a pizza restaurant. I used my experience as a food service worker to help. I asked students to guess the cost of six five-pound bags of cheese cost.
Some guessed $50. When I worked at a pizza restaurant, a case of cheese was $100.
We also discussed banking and allowances.
We gave students an assignment to talk with their parents about budgets and bank accounts.
The final lesson was making choices.
This was all about the voting system in the United States and making good decisions when it comes to work.
Each student received a job card such as librarian, police officer, custodian, teacher, etc.
They discussed how important each position was for the community and what would happen if that person didn’t show up to work one day.
Several of the students mentioned the school custodian and how important it was to have them at their school. They also mentioned the food service workers because without them they wouldn’t have lunch or breakfast.
When it came to voting I asked the students if their parents or siblings voted. Almost all of them raised hands, which was awesome.
All said they planned to vote after turning 18.
Then they got to do their favorite activity. They drew a campaign ad about how they would serve the community if voted onto city council or as mayor. Several students mentioned having more trashcans available in the community to help keep it cleaner and less littering. This was the week of Earth Day so this is most likely why they used that as their idea.
Hopefully everyone learned something. I had fun volunteering. In fact, if asked to do this again I probably would. And I’d recommend others try it, too.