Working with Others

I just finished my second week of camp. This location was different than the previous week. This time my group was almost all girls. The group was much calmer and smaller, which made it easier to control. I really felt like everything was in place to have an incredible week at camp, but the volunteers at this location were horrible. They would not stay at their assigned station, they were always on the phone, and they were more interested in flirting and bullying each other than being with the kids. Also when they were with the kids they would only play with the "cute" ones and never force the necessary work and activities.

Working with others is one thing that is pretty consistent throughout occupational therapy, and it is definitely a skill of mine that can be improved. The main technique I used to help harness the help of my volunteers was to assign them to very specific tasks. Volunteer A can you use hand over hand with Camper B to help complete the craft. The hardest thing to remember was most of the volunteers did not have experience and were terrified of forcing the movements. I have to say I was the same way just a few years ago. I tried to show clapping and drawing because those were some of the most common movements. The hardest part was I would repeat myself a hundred times. It is just frustrating, but I have a feeling it is going to happen again. I will try to work on my communication skills and hopefully these instances will be less common.

On the occupational school front I just ordered my books off Amazon. The nice thing was since the program is small and everybody is taking the same set of classes the professors due their best to limit the amount of books for all the courses by using the same book when applicable. The school recommended buying the books (vs renting) because we are starting to build our professional libraries. I tend to believe that is good advice. My books cost a little over $300 this year. Hopefully they were a worthwhile investment. I am going to find a good fun book to read because I have jury duty tomorrow. Hope it goes quickly.