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How Are We Already At Week 4?

We can’t believe that we are already at the fourth week of our afterschool programs!  Site directors have been nothing short of on their A-game to keep student’s energy and excitement at full capacity! Most of our programs are already ¼ of the way done, which makes for a lot of compassion overspilling in the kids participating! We have already learned so much from the students participating, as well as from the amazing directors and mentors who are constantly coming up with creative activities for the kids to better understand their unique and undeniably important ability to give back!

Site Director Terralyn Hicks discussing poverty with her kids.
Site Director Terralyn Hicks discussing poverty with her kids.

Our Site Director Spotlight of the week goes to none other than Terralyn Hicks of Chenoweth Elementary School. This week she taught her students about the Hunger Badge. Terralyn organized a group project for the kids to get hands on in understanding how they can help those who are dealing with hunger everyday of their lives. Terralyn set up a mock-soup kitchen where the kids served the staff of the school and their parents as they arrived to pick their children up. The kids were broken up into two groups: one group manning the line, and another group of kids walking around the lunch room collecting garbage and keeping the place tidy. Terralyn has been great at applying the lessons to practical skills and life lessons for the kids. It’s clear that the kids are dedicated to the program and are learning something from Terralyn’s dedication and creativity!

The students at Tully Elementary school learned about the Bullying Badge this week. This is a badge that many kids are

Ms. Renee reading the GGC story to her students at Tully Elementary.
Ms. Renee reading the GGC story to her students at Tully Elementary.

passionate about because they have all either witnessed or experienced it at least once in their lives. Though this is an unfortunate fact, it also highlights how important it is to openly discuss the negative impacts of bullying with kids so that they can help prevent or even stop it. Ms. Renee led a wonderful group discussion with her students as they shared their personal experiences with bullying, as well as why they’re so passionate about bringing an end to it. The environment is an open, bully-free zone so students were comfortable in being honest and vulnerable to how bullying has affected them, which allowed for a fruitful and effective conversation. Ms. Renee led a “warm and fuzzies” activity where she had each student write their name on a piece of paper and then pass it to their right for every student to write a genuinely kind comment about that person! Besides the smiles that the activity brought out from each student, the best part was how excited students were to create those smiles for one another! Oh how the kindness is spreading!

Carter Traditional student striking her best superhero pose!
Carter Traditional student striking her best superhero pose!

Our Superhero Spotlight School of the Week was Carter Traditional Elementary school where students were excited to learn about the Poverty Badge. The poverty badge is one of the more difficult ones for the kids to truly understand, but site director Robbin Norfleet did a fantastic job overcoming that challenge. She chose the Poverty Badge as the badge that the kids will focus their group service project on, so she was sure to cover the badge thoroughly. After doing an activity to better understand what poverty is, she had students break into groups to discuss project ideas to fulfil giving back to this badge! The students are voting for their favorite next week so stay tuned to see what great idea they come up with!

Needless to say, great things are happening within our program and we have a lot of people to thank for that! From the kids to the parents to the mentors to the site directors- the GGC afterschool program is doing awesome things and it’s all thanks to these fantastic individuals! We can’t wait to see what amazing things come about this week 4!

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