The Washington DC unit is taking a sabbatical year off for the 2021-22 MVS year. 

"My job is never boring. I spend my time teaching and playing with a group of diverse preschoolers as well as collaborating with other teachers to create meaningful lessons and materials, and the relationships I build make every day fulfilling in some way."
-current volunteer

Primary job responsibilities:

Data Collection and Child Assessment:

• Work with children in preschool classroom to collect observations of children and enter information into online assessment system that relates to how children are demonstrating progress toward meeting key skills and knowledge.
• Administer Pre-IPT language assessment (English language screener) in the fall to preschool students enter data on a spreadsheet.

Instructional Support (Pre-K) and Curriculum Development

• Implement recommended strategies for certain children with language, sensory, or behavior issues to provide additional classroom level support for students with learning needs.
• Implement small group activities at certain times of day with groups of about 3 or 4 children at a time that target key skills that those children need to practice. This data could come from consultations with teachers as well as GOLD and ASQ data, or other assessments that have been conducted.
• Communicate with special education coordinator, related service providers, classroom teacher, and early childhood leadership staff to maintain and build additional quality resources and classroom materials for students with special needs. This could include helping to research, search for, create, and order materials.
• Promote language and literacy development using evidence-based practices for teaching young English language learners and modeling correct English usage, grammar, spelling, punctuation and vocabulary
• Demonstrate respect for parents as children's first teacher and actively engage families in children's learning, collaborating with them to promote children's development in all areas. Seek ways to make connections with family members.

Daily/Weekly Interaction:
The volunteer will have the opportunity to interact with a multicultural, bilingual staff and student body daily, including early childhood students and their parents who are students in Briya's English-language program.

Challenging Aspects:

• Need to try out many strategies
• Use of a lot of repetition to teach language, concepts, and important life skills

Fulfilling Aspects:

• Working in a family literacy environment to help young children have positive and productive school experiences during the critical early years
• Working as a collaborative member of a committed, experienced, and diverse team
• Establishing positive relationships with young children and experiencing their natural curiosity and sense of wonder