We had successfully shown these students how to make learning fun, and we gave them a grammar lesson they would never forget. At the end of class, a young girl approached and said, “It is so fun with you.” I couldn’t help but smile. So many hands went up when it came to volunteering to be the next representative. When time was called, the sentence that had the least amount of mistakes would win.Īt first, the kids felt hesitant with the game, but by the last round they absolutely loved it. We split the class up into two teams and had each team designate a representative who would try to edit the sentence. We continued, “An English editing game.” A look of disappointment spread across all of their faces. When we arrived in class, we exclaimed, “Today we are going to play a game!” They were all excited. So we constructed sentences that had a variety of issues: wrong verb conjugation, missing determiners, incorrect phrases, etc.
My teaching partner and I had thought that maybe the students would enjoy playing an English editing game. There was another moment where I realized I had shown the students learning can be accomplished in a fun, competitive manner. Although these differences might seem small, it’s the sum of them that reveal our impact.” “There were countless other moments where I could see that we made a difference. With that comment, Brianna had taught me something new to appreciate in doing these service trips, and a new understanding for the differences that we ultimately were making. They are really what you can hope for during these service trips.
Brianna said that what they fail to notice is these little moments. I turned to Brianna, one of the India trip’s coordinators, and exclaimed, “Wow, she’s smiling!” Brianna replied, “Isn’t that amazing?” She proceeded to tell me that one of the common things that people say after doing volunteer trips is that they don’t really feel like they made any difference. It was just a few seconds, but I had made her just a little bit happier. She turned around without saying anything or looking at me, but then, slowly, a smile came to her face. I successfully tied the bracelet around her wrist and cut the extra ends off. My heart was pounding because I was so nervous yet excited to be having this special interaction with one of the residents, most of whom only spoke Hindi (so we couldn’t verbally communicate with them). I showed her the bracelet, and then proceeded to tie it around her wrist. She looked at it, stopped pacing, and promptly walked over to me with her hand up in front of her chest. So I grabbed three pieces of string, quickly braided them together, and then held the bracelet out in front of me. We were using string to put up the decorations and it occurred to me that I could make a bracelet for her. I saw one resident pacing - ten steps forward, stop, turn around, ten steps back, repeat. We were decorating the inside of one of the women’s dormitories. It was an incredibly special moment for me at Earth Saviours Foundation. There was a moment where I realized I could create a relationship without conversation. I may not have changed a child’s life or revolutionized their ability to speak English, but I did make that child smile while I taught her my childhood hand game, and I did teach an entire class the meaning of the words “unanimous” and “random.” It is moments such as these - real, tangible ones - where I now appreciate our impact. But I think this is the reality of doing a three week service trip. It took me awhile to come to this realization. Perhaps this dream wasn’t fully unrealistic, though it took me time to realize that the difference we had on those students we worked with at Vidya or the residents at Earth Saviours Foundation came not from groundbreaking changes but rather from the small moments. Photo showing the ninth grade class that my teaching partner and I taught. When we signed up for the service trip, I had the naive dream that I would make a huge impact on all the students that I would interact with.
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