May 23rd: Working from Home (Organizing and Picking crafts)

 


It was busy computer day today. I worked from home today- my supervisor had the day off- and began my internship at around nine and ended around two. I started off by organizing all my notes from the previous meeting and even taped them on my wall as well. I transferred and organized all those notes into my brand new sage notebook that I picked out just for my internship. Next, I wrote my schedule of hours into my planner to ensure I wouldn't miss any dates. Then I created a separate folder within my email for email communications pertaining to my internship so I could easily find and reference them as needed. Once all my information was organized, I reached out to our program correspondent for the LTISD (Lake Travis Independent School District) Summer Squires program inquiring about a program schedule for when and how long the bookmobile would spend with each age group. At our planning meeting, my supervisor hadn't heard back from them yet, however, we wanted an idea of the schedule so we could be better plan crafts for the kids. After a few email exchanges we settled on a schedule, that allowed the bookmobile to spend about 40 minutes with each group. 

I then set to work on my next task, planning out all the crafts for all the programs for the whole summer. It was my biggest task for the day and I knew researching crafts to fit our programs' needs would take a bit of time. Ms. Karen B. at our meeting told me to plan the same craft for all three programs- LTISD Summer School, LTISD Summer Squires, and Sweetwater- or whichever ones were occurring each week to make it easier for staff to track down materials and because each program would be a different set of kids it would be okay that the same craft is used at each. However, that meant finding crafts that could be done within the shortest time frame 15 minutes and one that would also appeal to kindergarteners through fifth graders. For my research for crafts, I combed through mommy craft sites, educational craft sites, and even Pinterest for ideas. It took a few hours, but I was able to create a packet with eight different crafts all complete with instructions, materials lists, picture examples, and even templates when needed. I pulled some crafts from sites but tweaked each one to fit the time constraints and material constraints of the bookmobile programs. I ended my work day by spending the last hour and half planning my first storytime for the Sweetwater program next week. I centered the storytime around colors and reserved a set of six books with the library as potential candidates to use within the timeframe.

Overall, while it was a lot planning and off-site work, I enjoyed getting to experience more of the behind the scenes of programming for youth. I am also very thankful to have all the crafts figured out for the rest of my internship as well that way there is more time to gather the necessary materials. 

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