"Social Action at the Homeless Shelter"

I've just begun getting involved with a very liberal church in Baltimore County. The other day they did a social action at a homeless shelter that lasted about 2 hours. It was a wonderfully successful event with magic, music, improv and ice cream.

I created a volunteer job for my self playing with the children who couldn't concentrate on the formal activities. It was very rewarding. Great to be able to use my gifts with children, give the parents a break and model positive techniques for managing children. Many parents if they aren't taught better techniques spend alot of time yelling and reprimanding..........................but here was an opportunity for me to model techniques that I learned such as:

"If you act excited about an activity so will they"

"Johnny, you can play with that toy for 10 minutes, and then we're going to give Sarah a turn"

Mark I love the way you just shared your toy good job"

"Sally, it hurts Mary when you slap like that, can you please use gentle touch, like this?"

There were approximately 50 beds in one room. Those are even more deplorable conditions perhaps then what I live with. Some of the children were able to have fun and experience joy during play or special actvities. But there were 3 or 4 kids , (one 8 years old and 3 or 4 of the kids were 2 or under) who had a real aura of sadness about them. No matter what I did I couldn't bring those children to smile. Kids are smart, aren't they? They know when something is really wrong, and child homelessness is really wrong.

I had a college work study job in 1990 where I was weekend house manager at the battered women's shelter. It was one of the most rewarding jobs I've ever had.