Personal Narrative: My First Kindergarten

On February 9, 2016, I began my first day as a volunteer at Nora Sterry Elementary School. I walked to the site with Carmen Garcia and it took about a half hour. On my way, we easily noticed the difference in Nora Sterry’s surrounding community and UCLA’s. Passing the freeway about a block away from the elementary school, homeless slept on the side walks of the streets.Though UCLA is near this location, the university is sphered by cool shops and tall buildings in Westwood. Not many would think that just a couple blocks down, a community would be impoverished. (Definitely a surprise)

It was hour four. I glanced at the tiny digital clock on the dusty, outdated, desktop computer. “Five minutes left in free play!” I yelled over the jumbled sound of Mario Kart, xylophones and freeze dance. The daycare had almost a club atmosphere at this point as muffled dance music blasted through the speakers; the only partition between the high-energy fitness center and us was a thin wall of glass, littered with sticky handprints. There were currently thirty children ranging from ages 3 to 12 and it was up to me my coworker to watch all of them, do payments and update the roster. She was busy with the infants, leaving me to take care of everything else. Much like a general getting ready for war, I prepared myself. Sometimes, the room would have up to 40 kids in it at once, so I had to be an authoritarian. I knew I had it in me; I had practice using my voice working at the preschool.

“Give me the ball!” a voice threatened, but I continued to dribble the ball. “Hey! Did you hear me? I want the ball!” the voice screamed. As I whirled around to examine what the commotion was, an iron fist smashed into my right eye, leaving me incapacitated. Jonathan Morris gifted me with a black eye.

Sitting in the timeout chair is my first recollection of nursery school. The stench of the bathroom was unbearable. Missed shots at the toilet and rank soap overwhelmed you as soon as the doors opened.

When at Park Hill Elementary School I was placed in a kindergarten class with Mrs. Maes. When I first entered the class, the environment was warm and inviting. All the students were interested in what the teacher was saying. After the teacher was done taking, she introduced me to the class and mentioned to the children to be on their best behavior and show their school ROAR. ROAR is a set of school wide rules that all the students follow. Throughout the day most of the students followed these rules, but some students did act out. The teacher proceeded to deal with each situation according to the student. It seemed like the teacher had specific rules to her class in addition to the school wide rules. In the class there was a student teacher,

I have worked with children that are a few months old to 17-years-old. Although I have had many experiences with elementary school students by being an Early Elementary and Special Education major, my main experiences have been through Junior Achievement, volunteering at a Sunday school for children with disabilities, and being a Resident Assistant.

Every day at school working with kindergarten children filled with lesson’s around the student’s interest, passions, and abilities. We as educators recognize when our student is falling behind in learning, so with taking advantage of every teachable moment imagine how far the student could go in this world. In my eleven years working with kindergarten children, I have had experience working children with ADHD. They run around or climb, have trouble paying attention to a task for more than a few minutes, not seem to listen when spoken to, and easily distracted, and don’t follow instructions no matter how clearly you present them.

I remember the first time I ever went to elementary school and I was scared out my mind. I really didn't want to go. I tried to run out but my uncle chip grabbed me before i could make it out the school. School was fun but I always wanted to stay home and chill.I didn't recall any favorite moments in elementary school.

Since I started my college, the pattern that continuously happening is sitting in the front row of the class. It was happened in my life when I was in the elementary school, but it wouldn’t stay that long, which I moved to the last row of the class. One day, my friend contacts me to improve my pattern by starting to sitting in front by giving good advices, and it works on it. I used Skinner theory, operant conditioning, to support my pattern. I also used the positive and negative reinforcement example to describe my pattern briefly. While, by sitting in the front row, I start to improve my grades by giving attention to the teachers and listen carefully.

I was scared. Scared of failure, scared of being laughed at. Throughout kindergarten and elementary school, people would say “Konichiwa” when they saw me or tease me because I was Asian. Then, just when I transferred to a new school, I was picked on again. I knew they were joking, but their comments affected me. I told my mom that I didn’t want to go to school anymore, but it was said in vain. The thought that maybe interacting with people wasn’t the best idea became increasingly favorable and soon enough, I put up my walls. I would never be the first to initiate social interaction, they would have to approach me. Even then, I wouldn’t say much. I was safe; this method was not harmful, but it was not beneficial either.

During kindergarten I learned the alphabet, how to tie my shoe, and how to make friends. My kindergarten teacher was Mrs. Kaufman and all of my friends that lived near me were in my class, and I was so excited. Unfortunately, within the first day, all of my friends were moved to another class because our class was too big. I was devastated, but this did not stop me from making other friends. In Mrs. Kaufman’s class we learned the alphabet by creating special days for each letter in the alphabet. My favorite day was pajama day because I could feel comfortable all day. Although there were highlights, I often tried to go home sick so I would not have to be at school. I would complain of a stomach ache weekly even if I did not have one. Eventually that went away and I rolled into first grade. For first grade I had Mr. Hewitt, who was a new teacher, but I the teacher I was hoping to get was Mr. Garber because his room was western themed. At the time I loved horses and thought it would be cool to be part of his class. I realized Mr. Hewitt’s class was not all that bad, and even had a crush on him for the longest time. For most of first grade I was friends with a girl

I loved walking into Kindergarten because I remember the first thing everyone always had to do first was play dress up. They had props out for everyone to try one. It made everything more comfortable and you didn’t feel scared when you walked in. As much as I loved that it came out to be the worst idea ever because everyone ended up getting lice because everyone was sharing hats and clothing. It started well ended not so good. Besides that I had the best Kindergarten teacher in my opinion. Her name was Mrs. Worth, she was older, but she was a fantastic teacher who even though I wasn’t the strongest learner she knew and helped me each day I needed it. She was tall, skinny and wore glasses. She had very fair skin and always wore those sass shoes with jeans and a nice button up shirt. The biggest thing for everyone in Kindergarten was recess time. It was like the olympics for us. We played everything for basketball to kick ball, to chasing the boys we just thought were the hottest thing. I can remember this one kid his name was Skyler and he thought he was just the best at basketball. He would practically dance with the ball it was so

The end of seventh grade year is something I’ll never forget. The February of my seventh grade year, (2013) my mom told my sister and I that we were moving back to Illinois. I thought that it was going to be a good thing and a bad thing, because I had grown up there, but I could get a fresh start here. I was bullied really badly and I didn’t really have any friends at either school I had gone to while we lived in Arizona, so I was kind of ready to just get out of that area. We found out in February, and my dad drove my sister and I back on May 28th 2013, two days after school ended. I was unsure leading up to it, because I’d never moved anywhere or anything, so I didn’t understand how it worked really, or how weird or different it would be. We started packing about half way through March, putting the things that we wouldn’t need for a while in boxes and bubble wrapping breakables. It was kind of fun and cool, but at the same time it was weird to think that I would be leaving my childhood home, I had been born in the next town and had grown up in Sanders. I mean, we’d been back here to see my grandma and my mom’s family because they all live close to this area, but I never thought that we’d live back here. I started telling people as soon as I knew, because some of the kids that went to my youth group actually talked to me sometimes, and the leader liked me, so I told them so that they would know once the time came. I told some of my teachers as it got closer as well,

I used to not be shy. When I was younger, I liked to talk to everyone, I liked to have friends, but as the years went on I became more closed off. I did not have as many friends. I started to become quiet only answering when the teacher asked me a question. I talked to only a small group of friends. Now that I am older I am starting to learn and accept myself for being the way that I am. I have learned to use this as an advantage, I have become a good listener and am able to give advice. Even though I wasn’t always like this it always takes time.

Over the course of this semester I had the opportunity to teach at three very different schools in the Laramie area, St. Laurence, Snowy Range Academe, and the Lad school located on the University of Wyoming campus. At these different locations I was able to teach Pre-k through 2nd grade. I was also exposed to teaching in very different locations, school set ups, and teaching styles of the resident teachers.