My name is Rosie Crutchley, I am 17 years old and a mentor at the Saints Study Centre. I am a 6th former from Wrenn School in Wellingborough and had the honour of being reccomended to the centre after teaching Science at a local primary school. I have been a mentor here since May for one night a week after school and been helping at the summer school for the last 3 weeks during my summer holiday. I am working towards a Vinspired voluenteering award and the hours I put into the Study Centre all count towards this. I am undecided whether to become a teacher as my future career so this is just the sort of experience I need to help me come to a decision.
During the last week of the Summer Challenge, the children have taken part in a wide variety of activities and our roles as mentors has allowed us to be part of the fun! Monday was a brilliant day full of puppet making, the children were encouraged to express themselves in order for them to build their self confidence, these ideas were drawn down on paper in the form of a puppet design. After lunch, all the fantastic designs were brought into life by socks, pop socks, cardboard and some stuffing, the group’s enthusiasm was electric and all of the finished results were enough to make “The Muppets” jealous! I could not resist making my own, but it just did not match up to the children’s standards.
Unfortunatley, during week 3, we did not get the chance to visit Brixworth Country Park for orienteering, however, we still managed to fill the day with some other brilliant activities! In the morning, we worked on the computers, compiling a photostory describing how to make a puppet, during which the children added their own commentary and music to add to the impact of their story. We then saved this to a disc for them to keep a memory of puppet making at the Saints.
Robolab was Wednesday’s activity for the day; the children used the computers to program a self made lego buggy to race in the Saints Summer Challenge very own Grand Prix!
Amongst a Saints shop visit and a practical rugby session, a “Maths is Fun” workshop took up Thursday; the group were taught how to make shapes out of paper and were then given the challenge to make a design in small groups, all the chilren were fantasitc, so they can never moan again about maths lessons!
I have been fascinated by the cohesion within the group this week, the way that the children have made instant friends with each other, something which only comes with building self confidence. The children arrived on Monday morning, shy and unwilling to express themselves and they leave on Thursday afternoon a big group of friends who have learnt some valuable lessons this week. I feel so proud as I leave the summer school knowing that in some way or another, I have influenced the great time that the children have experienced this week. I will be returning in September to help at PFS and no doubt be here next summer for another fantastic summer holiday!
