SHANI PENN The Dream Academy
In August I began volunteering as a tutor at DREAM, a youth develop- ment program in Harlem. I’ve been passionate about child development, social activism and education from a very young age. As a tutor at DREAM my daily task is getting a group of twelve 6th grade boys to complete their weekly English assignments well and on time. My refrains in class take on a consistent pattern of “I’m going to turn into a parrot if I have to tell you to get out your assignment again Chris”, “an essay can’t be one sentence Michael,” and many many choruses of “Language arts is not boring, it can be fun!” My students have a fighting chance at the Olym- pics for aggressive eye-rolling. Despite the expected challenges to convince any kid to take homework seriously, it is a truly rewarding ex- perience helping to improve student success in class, and I’ve found that my students are constantly helping me understand what the path to bet- ter learning actually looks like. It’s far from simply getting the correct an- swer to problem sets or passing the next test. For these kids, learning is an all day experience. In addition to withstanding a con- stant flood of academic information,
they are figuring out how to interact with new personalities, dealing with hormones and discovering the com- plexities of our society. In my role trying to ensure academic enrich- ment I find my sessions depending less on going over specific material and more on guiding students on how to relate new knowledge to personal experiences involving family, friends and community. “What does this passage remind you of?” “How do you feel while reading this?” “What would you do in a situation like the writer describes?” “My students have a fighting chance at the Olympics for aggressive eye-rolling.”
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