Activities and Leadership
Throughout my pre-clinical career, I participated in several organizations and activities. This page highlights how each of these activities helped me grow and develop as an aspiring Child Life Specialist.
Assistant Teacher at Auburn University's Early Learning Center
From August of 2018 to May of 2019, I worked as an Assistant Teacher at Auburn University's Early Learning Center. The AUELC is a play-based learning program that fosters the natural development of children. I worked alongside the head teacher in leading a mixed-aged classroom of three to five-year-olds through daily school activities (i.e. group time, snack, and various centers). Through this experience, I learned how to use my skills and talents to best interact with young children. I was able to grow in my leadership skills and I now feel significantly more confident in my abilities. I have also collected a variety of ideas and tools to use in my future career as a Child-Life Specialist. In the future, I will implement skills I learned such as teaching emotional regulation, scaffolding, and successfully talking to and building relationships with children in the hospital as well as in my everyday life. I spent the semester gathering information about each child and monitoring their developmental progress. This gave me the opportunity to practice and better my abilities for when I will make developmental assessments of children in the hospital. Overall, this was an experience that pushed me to new areas of growth, allowed me to practice what I have learned, and gave me a deeper passion for working with children.
Auburn University Social Skills Training
In the Spring of 2019, I participated in a service learning course at Auburn University focused on the importance of social skills training for rejected peers. The first six weeks of the course, we spent time discussing the research behind rejected peers and preparing activities for a group of children at a local elementary school. The last six weeks of the course, we implemented these activities with a group of six fifth graders. Different skills were discussed and practiced with these children. Some of the highlighted skills included telling about yourself, asking questions in conversation, understanding different points of view, keeping your cool, being a good friend, practicing sportsmanship, and reading cues to interpret a situation. Because of this opportunity, I have gained experience leading and implementing group activities with school aged children. Throughout the six weeks, the students became more comfortable with us and we got the chance to know their personalities while assessing their strengths and weaknesses. With this information, we were able to tailor each session to fit the needs of the children. Because of this experience, I have practiced the skill of assessing children's needs and fitting intervention based on these needs. This is an important skill to have as a Child Life Specialist and will be useful in my future career. In addition, I have gained practice thinking on my feet and adjusting when plans did not always go as expected. This taught me how to be flexible, an extremely crucial skill when working with children. As a student at the graduate level, I assumed a leadership role with the other undergraduate students in the course. I learned how to communicate effectively, organize meetings, and make sure the sessions ran as smooth as possible. Having this leadership role has helped prepare me to work with the volunteers I will coordinate in the hospital as a Child Life Specialist. As a whole, my experience teaching social skills was challenging, but provided me with so many useful ideas and allowed me to practice the skills necessary for my future career. After only six weeks, we began to see the kids grasp the concepts we had discussed. When I heard the individual stories of how each child utilized the skills they had learned, I realized the meaningful impact six short weeks can have.
Camp Smile-A-Mile Counselor
For one week during the Summer of 2017, I had the incredible opportunity to be a counselor at Camp Smile-A-Mile, a camp for children ages 13 to 16 who have been affected by cancer. For an entire week, I helped engage children affected by cancer in normalization activities such as arts and crafts, swimming, and boating activities so that they could get to be kids for once without the stressors of treatments and hospitalization. This week changed me more than I could have possibly imagined. These children are so full of joy and taught me far beyond anything I could ever teach them. To immediately form such close relationships with them as well as see them bond with each other was something so special. For one week, they got to celebrate being kids and have the opportunity to relate with people who could understand them in a way that most cannot. This week taught me the importance of having genuine interactions with people, humility, and just how crucial it is to step back and enjoy life to the fullest. I walked away with relationships that I know will continue throughout the rest of my life and I am so thankful for the week I was able to share at Camp Smile-A-Mile.
Storybook Farm Volunteer
Since the fall semester of 2015, I have participated as a volunteer at Storybook Farm. This organization is a hippo-therapy center designed for children with disabilities in Opelika, Alabama. Their motto is "Hope on Horseback," working to improve the self-esteem, confidence, and physical abilities of the children. I worked with kids of all ages and circumstances and experienced something different every day. My jobs included handling the horses, taking the kids on a ride, and doing different activities each week such as “musical stalls” and obstacle courses. Through these, the organization hopes to improve their communication skills, balance, and mental and physical strength, each depending on the child's needs. This experience taught me patience, teamwork and has given me a deeper, more genuine passion and desire for working with children. I looked forward to seeing the same kids each week. These kids ended up teaching me a lot more than I could have ever taught them.
Project Uplift Volunteer
Project Uplift is an an on-campus organization whose main goal is to help children develop constructive, happy lives so that the delinquency rate in our county will decrease. I have had the pleasure for the past year and a half to mentor two sisters, ages 10 and 6, from the Auburn community. Every week, my mentoring partner and I pick them up and spend time with them. We often go to a park, play Frisbee, bake, do crafts, help with homework, and do many other fun activities that we plan out for each week. This experience has taught me the importance of leading by example and building strong relationships with my girls in order to help with behavior and provide a positive influence in their lives. They look up to us as their older "sisters" and it's incredible to have seen them grow and mature into wonderful young women throughout the years. I look forward to seeing them each week and can honestly say that they have become two of my greatest friends that have made my experience at Auburn unforgettable.
Auburn University Dance Marathon
During the 2016-2017 school year, I had the opportunity to serve as the Assistant Director of High School Relations for Auburn University Dance Marathon (AUDM). AUDM is an organization that raises funds and generates awareness for the Children’s Hospital at Midtown Medical Center of Columbus Regional Health, our local Children’s Miracle Network Hospital. Throughout the year, different events are put on to raise money and support and fight for the kids. My job this past year was to act as a liaison between the local high schools and AUDM by working with the students to fundraise and host a Mini-Marathon of their own as well as encourage them to attend and participate in Auburn University's 14-hour main event. Through this position, I learned how to most effectively work as a team, practiced the importance of communication, and learned how much hard work can pay off. Realizing just how much the final total of $541,832.06 would affect the lives of so many kids and families in our community is one of the most rewarding feelings and I am so proud to be a part of an organization that cares so much for the kids who are fighting for their lives every single day.
Mission Trips
I have spent three spring breaks serving the people of the Dominican Republic. While on the trips, I did some light construction work, put together school supplies for the kids at an underprivileged school in the area, handed out water filters that provide clean water, and most importantly built relationships with the kids in the small, impoverished town. This experience showed me patience by working with kids who do not necessarily know how to act in normal social situations because of the environment that they grew up in. It also taught me how to build relationships, even though there was a language barrier between us. These trips gave me a better understanding of life in third-world countries and gave me a deeper passion for children and a new passion for the country that I would not have had before.
*All images used with permission*