I woke up today dreading the morning. I was extremely nervous to spend more time doing outreach with younger at risk youth because the day before at the Kingston YMCA had gone so poorly (although I had been completely unprepared.) The kids were unruly, our plan of attack was weak, and my information limited. This morning though, I was ready.
I walked out of the peace corps bus onto LEAP (essentially a school which teaches at risk youth basic trades for employment) school's grounds armed with HIV notes, condoms, dildos and a game plan. We were greeted by a principal who proceeded to make inaprorpiate conversation with us, and were finally led to the students. We introduced ourselves, lined up the students, and seperated them into a few groups of 10 (at the YMCA we had learned that smaller groups work much better.)
We then led our group into a small (air conditioned!) room. Two truths and lie was our first activity. In this game, the students were to give three facts about themselves, and the others had to guess which of the three statements was a lie. Most of the statements revolved around simple things such as food or Jamaican football but allowed us to create rapport with the kids as well as give insight into the group dynamics, personalities, and gage attentiveness. Much like sales you have to know your client and gain trust before you can get into the nitty gritty work.
Our second activity was led my me. I ran an HIV hot potato game, where if the music (we played Jamaican dancehall music which I think helped to further build rapport) stopped the student holding the hot patato (wad of individual paper layers) had to unwrap a layer. Each paper layer had a number which correlated to a question pertaining to healthy sex. A lot of the questions were aimed at creating a basic knowledge of HIV; some of the questions were to demonstrate proper condom usage or disposal.
Most of kids had at least a basic knowledge, although there was one student who actually knew each exact step and was able to demonstrate for the rest of the group which was both helpful and impressive. (I like to encourage group knowledge rather than lectures because hearing life lessons from your peers is always more effective.) Besides a few hiccups with kids not wanting to touch the dildo, (Jamaica is extremely homophobic) the activity went really well and the students were able to discuss what they had learned.
Our second activity was led by the other two PCTs in my group. We defined long and short term goals, while encouraging the students to create their own chart of long and short term personal and career goals. Most of the students were at least able to draw their goals, (a few were unable to write) and a few more were willing to share. During this time I became aware of a slower student. During his turn to share, he spoke very quietly and extremely slowly. A few of the other students explained that he was "slow" (I replied no problem) but I 'took time' (as they say in Patwa) and kneeled down to his eye level to look him in the eye, trying to show patience and understanding. I believe he felt more comfortable and continued what he was saying a bit more confidently. During this time we walked around to each student giving them personal attention to help them to create plans for the goals. Some of the goals were to acquire materials (cars, houses) others were career orientated (chefs, football coaches) and a few were to have a family which I found both sweet and a bit scary (these were mostly 16/17 year olds!)
The kids were as attentive as they possibly could be (I was impressed) and fairly effectively completed the activities and discussions. We then rewarded them to a paper airplane contest to see whose could fly the longest-- led by the male PCT. The students absolutely loved it. It was really awesome to connect with them-- as I could tell a lot of them are not regularly respected by adults especially teachers (a lot of them had not completed high school.) I think they really appreciated our respect and really enjoyed our time together. At the end of the day the teacher approached us to say that she had never seen them so engaged let alone completely happy to ignore the break they were apparently supposed to have. As we waited for the bus to take us back, I was elated to have made a visible difference and to share in camaraderie with some of the students who were asking us when we'd come back and if I'd be their girlfriend (both slightly alarming and flattering.) What an amazing experience. I left saddened thinking about how, due to its location in Kingston, peace corps volunteers are not placed with LEAP.
I walked out of the peace corps bus onto LEAP (essentially a school which teaches at risk youth basic trades for employment) school's grounds armed with HIV notes, condoms, dildos and a game plan. We were greeted by a principal who proceeded to make inaprorpiate conversation with us, and were finally led to the students. We introduced ourselves, lined up the students, and seperated them into a few groups of 10 (at the YMCA we had learned that smaller groups work much better.)
We then led our group into a small (air conditioned!) room. Two truths and lie was our first activity. In this game, the students were to give three facts about themselves, and the others had to guess which of the three statements was a lie. Most of the statements revolved around simple things such as food or Jamaican football but allowed us to create rapport with the kids as well as give insight into the group dynamics, personalities, and gage attentiveness. Much like sales you have to know your client and gain trust before you can get into the nitty gritty work.
Our second activity was led my me. I ran an HIV hot potato game, where if the music (we played Jamaican dancehall music which I think helped to further build rapport) stopped the student holding the hot patato (wad of individual paper layers) had to unwrap a layer. Each paper layer had a number which correlated to a question pertaining to healthy sex. A lot of the questions were aimed at creating a basic knowledge of HIV; some of the questions were to demonstrate proper condom usage or disposal.
Most of kids had at least a basic knowledge, although there was one student who actually knew each exact step and was able to demonstrate for the rest of the group which was both helpful and impressive. (I like to encourage group knowledge rather than lectures because hearing life lessons from your peers is always more effective.) Besides a few hiccups with kids not wanting to touch the dildo, (Jamaica is extremely homophobic) the activity went really well and the students were able to discuss what they had learned.
Our second activity was led by the other two PCTs in my group. We defined long and short term goals, while encouraging the students to create their own chart of long and short term personal and career goals. Most of the students were at least able to draw their goals, (a few were unable to write) and a few more were willing to share. During this time I became aware of a slower student. During his turn to share, he spoke very quietly and extremely slowly. A few of the other students explained that he was "slow" (I replied no problem) but I 'took time' (as they say in Patwa) and kneeled down to his eye level to look him in the eye, trying to show patience and understanding. I believe he felt more comfortable and continued what he was saying a bit more confidently. During this time we walked around to each student giving them personal attention to help them to create plans for the goals. Some of the goals were to acquire materials (cars, houses) others were career orientated (chefs, football coaches) and a few were to have a family which I found both sweet and a bit scary (these were mostly 16/17 year olds!)
The kids were as attentive as they possibly could be (I was impressed) and fairly effectively completed the activities and discussions. We then rewarded them to a paper airplane contest to see whose could fly the longest-- led by the male PCT. The students absolutely loved it. It was really awesome to connect with them-- as I could tell a lot of them are not regularly respected by adults especially teachers (a lot of them had not completed high school.) I think they really appreciated our respect and really enjoyed our time together. At the end of the day the teacher approached us to say that she had never seen them so engaged let alone completely happy to ignore the break they were apparently supposed to have. As we waited for the bus to take us back, I was elated to have made a visible difference and to share in camaraderie with some of the students who were asking us when we'd come back and if I'd be their girlfriend (both slightly alarming and flattering.) What an amazing experience. I left saddened thinking about how, due to its location in Kingston, peace corps volunteers are not placed with LEAP.
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