My Internship is at a locally owned children's art studio named The Paintbox. This small business is located in a quiet neighborhood in University Heights. My job entails looking after the children, interacting with them, cleaning up at the end of our sessions, providing my students with a kind yet responsible leader, and assisting with any art or crafting needs. From my experience with taking care of children, these are only some of the things I will need to do to do my job efficiently, at the same time while allowing the little ones to have free creative reign over their projects. While I do not expect my time as a team leader to be easy, interacting and communicating with my students will be second nature to me. Here forth I am making a big step in my life to truly find out if the field of childcare is the right one for me. This experience will help me find a heightened sense of patience and will help me with communication skills. Even when things get tense. I also hope this experience will also help me find some inner peace within my younger self.
How do you see yourself growing or changing over the course of your internship?
From spending my time at this internship this experience has given me insight on responsibility and productiveness. Although this job isn’t the hardest, it’s one where to gain the best results in organization and time management you need to put in your all. Even at simple tasks so when it’s done, it feels like a grand accomplishment. I see myself becoming more attentive and focused on my future. I also see myself getting a better sense of time management, and pushing myself even when I don’t want to get out of bed.
How has or do you see your internship changing the way you consider that paths your future will take?
After doing this, my view on the childcare career is still something I may consider. But after seeing the difficulties that come along with this profession, it’s definitely been altered to 50/50. The main problem that I’ve seen occur is clean up! It seems like a lot at times when you have a group of kids to watch over, then after the day the whole room looking like it’s been flipped upside down. As well as handing so many children at once, especially the ones on the younger side. All different personalities in one room can get absolutely exhausting! But honestly the best part about this job, is having the students coming to you for help. Getting to see them happy and having a good time expressing their creativity with drawings and projects, is so endearing to me.
Week 3 Blog 1
6. What are you thankful for in your internship experience?
I’m thankful to have met and interacted with these little artists. All of them are very talented in their own ways, and all have interesting styles that never fail to impress me. Talking to some of them about their ideas makes me Incredibly enlightened. I’m also thankful that I get to see this from an outside view as a young adult, although it feels bittersweet at times that I won’t ever get to experience being a kid again, it cheers me up that I get to make my student's creative journey a positive one. Lastly, I’m just thankful for the people who manage our environment and the teamwork myself and my co-workers all do to make the every kids experience an exciting one.
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7. Do you have any regrets so far? What would you do differently if you could start internship over? I definitely regret not eating in the mornings, and spending all my time on my phone before internship. If I could go back I’d eat an energizing meal and probably drink less Red Bull. Also, I wish on some days I could start over and dress a little bit better so I wouldn’t trip over my pants while organizing or be too cold.
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5. What advice would you give to a junior in high school who wants to pursue a career in the field of your internship?
Some advice I would give to a junior would be to remember to eat breakfast and lunch, even when things can get crazy because having as much energy as possible keeps you focused and also makes the day go by a lot faster. Another piece of advice I recommend is to proactive sewing and organizing skills before you start.
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7. Are you going to continue working with your internship site or mentor after internship is over? If so, how did these plans develop? What will you be doing?
I’m planning on working in the summer time at Paintbox because I love the environment and I also would love to try a hand at sewing and fashion things. I have to learn how to sew on the machine better and I have to learn how to hand sew.