During this CAS experience, I volunteered for community service held at our school. I was the leader of the ICT dept, in which we had to teach computer skills to underprivileged students. This was done on 3 weekends, both Saturdays and Sundays, during the end of July and August. I volunteered for this event because I like giving service to people, who are coming from challenged backgrounds. People who don’t have the access to the things we often take for granted. This is why I signed up for leading the ICT dept, at community service at our school. This primarily reflects the service part of CAS; however, it would also include creativity as we had to creatively plan activities, which would be exciting for a wide range of ages students.

LO1 - Identify own strengths and develop areas for growth

Firstly, identified my strengths and therefore decided that I would mostly be in charge of the technical aspect of planning the activities. However, I lacked the skills of teaching to a younger set of students. It was important to know this, I with my strengths, could curate a plan with better and more reliable websites for students to practice typing. I could make the plan more fun by selecting apps which I felt were better for the younger audience. However, Since I accepted that I was weak in teaching, I got to take every opportunity to learn how to teach.

LO2 - Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in process

It was challenging for me to teach young students. Especially those who weren’t really paying attention and also weren’t listening. It was challenging because even if you tried to teach them something, they wouldn’t listen therefore it was hard to keep them in control. While I had taught younger kids before, they weren’t from these kinds of challenging backgrounds. Therefore, I did have some experience, but not that much. I did overcome this challenge. By using the language that those kids would use. I also tried to know them more personally and develop a mentor-like bond with them. This was very helpful, and I found myself teaching a lot of kids during the camp. I had learned the skill to learn and teach. I felt great after finally completing the challenge.

LO3 - Demonstrate how to initiate and plan a CAS experience

When I was planning the things that we were going to do for the community service, I kept myself organised, by thinking from the perspective of the students who were going to come. Therefore, I divided the plan into 2 board areas. One for the younger audience and another one for the audience which was more grown up. The older students got to learn HTML and coding, which kept them interested. While the smaller kids got to play typing and math games, which kept them interested. While I am not the most organised person, this was definitely a good and much-needed change. Initiating is easier said than done. On the field, we faced a lot of problems which we just couldn’t anticipate during the planning process. One of them was that students couldn’t simply understand English, or even sometimes Hindi. Therefore we always had one person speaking Gujarati with the groups, so that they can facilitate the session or even lead the sessions. Now with the experience, I think doing events like this might be easier as I am well aware of what happens on the field and therefore anticipate these changes during my planning process.

LO4 – Show commitment to and perserverance in CAS experiences

Planning and then initiating made things a lot easier, as it allowed us to have a guiding point during the entire time. Which allowed us to be on track without losing too much focus. With these kinds of challenges commitment of necessary. Since we had to face these challenges on a daily basis it was important for us to not lose our cool and be committed to giving the best service throughout. We were committed to keeping the students interested in the content we were trying to give them and making sure they can remember the most important parts in the best way possible. It wasn’t so easy to stay like this, it did require a lot of motivation to do it.

LO5 - Demostrate the skills and recognize the benefits of working collaboratively

We had to do this in a group. While I do not usually work in groups, this time was a good change. This is primarily because the project does complete a lot faster, and I can have a greater degree of control of the project. It was easier to work with the people this time around. Since we shared a common goal and vision it was easier for us to come to a mutual consensus. It automatically allows the free flow of ideas which were accepted by almost everyone. I had to however work with a participant in our group. She was in first grade, which was below the age specification which we said. Therefore, we couldn’t even teach her computers. But, sticking to what we wanted to do, we took turns playing with her in the atrium with the Jenga blocks. She liked it and had a great time. Even though she might not have been able to learn something, she wasn’t actually wasting her time, as she got to experience things she never would have. It was a win-win situation for all of us. Leadership was important so that everyone worked in the direction that we were supposed to go in. Leadership gave us the motivation which helped everyone work as hard as they can for the service of underprivileged children.

LO6 - Demostrate engagement with issues of global significance

Doing all of this allowed us to touch upon a few global issues. Quality education and inequalities. These problems are very important to us as this shape the next generations. If the next generation grows up to be very unsustainable, then we as mankind would be doomed. We provided them with quality education. We also treated everyone equally. Knowing these issues allow me to personally become more sensitive to such issues, where people can’t receive the education, they want just because it’s not their fault. It makes me feel concerned after understanding these issues on the ground level, however, doing this gives me hope that education can spread further without the restrictions of language and communication.

In conclusion, I had a great time doing this event for 3 weeks. I learned a lot of new things and understood a lot of new contexts. It made me more sensitive to a certain situation and therefore allowed me to connect to people whom I previously couldn’t.