C.A.S CARES - Homeward Bound Finale

Anya Swapp
Apr 20, 2017
2 min read

I must say that it was a joy spending time with the children at the National Childrens’ Home. My team and I had our last time with them on Saturday, April 8th 2017, when we had a small fun day as the finale for our project right at the home. With short sprint races, relays and a mini football match, the children were overall grateful for our company, especially when they were all rewarded with sweets and keepsakes.

Our self initiative C.A.S. (Creativity Activity and Service) project, to extend our service at the National Children’s home, was aimed to introduce to young people how playing games and keeping active can better their social interaction with people, create close bonds with them, as well as it builds team spirit and also contributes to an all rounded healthy lifestyle. With my love for Track and field and my other partners love for football we based our program on those sports which allowed us to also teach and practice with the children techniques from each sport. We wanted these visits to just be fun, as our intention was for each visit to serve as stress relievers. I must say together we scored well accomplishing all these goals.

Yes, this project was not easy at all because dealing with over thirty children which also range in age is a mighty task. As you know from, “homeward Bound” which was a reflection on our first visit, I was in doubt that this project was going to run as smoothy as I planned for it to be. However I must say that each visit got better and we got comfortable and more accustom to each other. I was able to create some sort of order by splitting the children into four teams. Happily with the various activities, they saw the need to be in teams and were also interested to name their own team as well. I also saw that the children became a little more flexible as they allowed me to teach them new games and track techniques. We definitely had fun doing track together, so much so that even some of the boys who were playing football wanted to join in on the action.

This project definitely taught me how to organize and initiate a community service project, it proved to me that collaboration really gets the job done faster and is less burdensome. It also became clear to me that through every challenge there is a beneficial outcome. With the various experiences that I got myself involved, I became a believer of extending yourself outside of your comfort zone, as this is where growth and new skills develop. I encourage you to extend yourself and be involved in your community! Be a creative, active and serviceable person as it shows how much you care!