This past Friday, we had the opportunity to lead various activities for girls who are rising 4th-6th graders and are participating in the YESS Entrepreneurship. Through the YESS externship, which is based on an entrepreneurship curriculum, the girls will be creating their own businesses during the summer. The activities that we chose to do with the girls were Sing & Dance, Lava, Evolution, Captain’s Coming, and Four Corners. We began with Sing & Dance because we thought that the girls would enjoy this activity because it required creativity and energy.
The girls were separated into four groups, and each group chose a Disney movie. Once each group had chosen a movie, the girls were asked to pick a song from the movie to sing and dance to in front of their peers. We found that many of the girls were not excited about performing the song and choreography in front of the other girls. Additionally, it was interesting that some of the girls did not like the fact that we were using Disney songs because they did not know the songs and preferred modern songs. This indicated that there were generational differences between us and the YESS girls. The girls in my DukeEngage group and I grew up watching the Disney classics and memorizing the songs, but that was not the case for all of the YESS girls. This experience reminded me that when we plan activities for younger children we should focus more on what they would enjoy rather than using activities that we would have enjoyed when we were young because generational differences are real. In order to work with the girls that were not happy about the activity, we permitted the girls that did not want to dance to merely sing the songs. We also compromised with one group by allowing them to choose a song from Trolls, which is not a Disney movie but is more familiar to the girls.
Due to the fact that Eureka! Camp begins on Monday, I am glad that we experienced this situation. I realized that the girls at Eureka! may not enjoy every activity or be utterly pleased throughout each moment of camp. I learned that it is best to have a back-up plan in case the majority of the girls are not enthusiastic about the activity. Additionally, I found that when situations like this occur, a good solution is to compromise. Compromising works because it prevents me from having to alter my entire plan and prevents the girls from being forced to do an activity that they will not enjoy. Ultimately, I want to become comfortable with the idea that there may be times that the girls will not like the activity that I have chosen, and that is okay. However, I must be flexible and willing to work with them so that they can make the most of their time at Eureka!.