my coaching experience

I've been with coach art about 6 months and its been an amazing experience! You can get involved as much or little as you want. I signed up and didn't really know what I was getting into. I didn't think I had the skills it took to be a coach so started with the in hospital workshops. After a few months the girls called me and asked if I'd be willing to teach art to a 5year old girl...ART! hmmm I am no artists, the girls at Coach Art assured me I was capable...so I did it. It was AWESOME! Not only did I show up the first day and this little 5 Year old was sooooo excited to see me she had an entire wall of art to show me. She was an artist and I knew I was going to learn a thing or two from her. We started with the colors of the rainbow and moved onto self portraits in the later weeks. We learned from each other every week and grew together as artist. It was special and honestly I couldn't have asked for a better match...so don't be shy if you aren't a professional at the specific subject the child wants to learn, just you being there and having fun makes a difference. ---britt

in hospital workshop - OUTPATIENT!

Last week I was over a CHLA, I had a workshop on the 5th floor "out patient". It was my first time with the out patient kids, and I found it a little more difficult. The kids are in and out, going to get test coming back to wait for results....its absolute madness but a good time if you are prepaid. I would suggest not doing crafts that take up time ie: no paint, or things that need to dry. Paper hats, boats, origami-ISH things that they can color and take home would work. Trust me I learned the hard way and after I left the 5th floor I was covered in paint, glue, and a mish mosh of the colored glitter I had brought...it wasn't pretty. The kids are still awesome though and still just as rewarding as being on any other floor, so don't be sacred just PREPARED:) ---britt

new coaching experience!

I have been so busy lately that most of the time I don't even know what day of the week it is. So this afternoon when I was flipping through my planner I was not surprised when I realized that I was looking at the wrong week, however I was surprised to see that my first out-patient coaching session is less than 2 weeks away -- it seemed so long ago when I got the email telling me that I had been matched with students who want to learn how to cook!

Now, let me stop here and say that I am in no way a "professional chef", in fact, growing up I was always the kid who had wanted so badly to surprise my family with a culinary delight only to be left with what looked like a science experiment gone horribly wrong (usually involving a burning smell coming from the oven). Thankfully as an adult, I have once again channeled that inner desire to be a chef and have managed to actually uncover that bit of talent that was buried so deeply in my youth. Now I cook all the time. I watch the Food Network as if it is 24 hour cable news -- I love it!

So, back to the students...I'm not sure why, but I was expecting to teach kids who were a bit older how to cook, so you can imagine my surprise when I saw that my 2 students (siblings, a boy and girl) were ages 5 and 7! What does one teach a 5 and 7 year old to cook?!? I mean cooking essentially involves sharp objects and fire and those are not 5 and 7 year old friendly things! At first I was intimidated, I questioned my ability to actually be able to teach kids how to cook. What if I had let my constant time with the likes of Rachel Ray and Paula Deen inflate my confidence? What if after my fist lesson the parents called the CoachArt office in search of a new coach? The scenarios in my head were endless!

So I turned to a faithful friend in my time of doubt: Google! As I typed in search after search there were pages and pages of ideas and kid friendly recipes. What I discovered was that it is more about giving the kids confidence and a little bit of control. It is also about giving them the ability to help their moms and dads with the responsibility of cooking and feeding the family! It allows them to spend that precious time together that most families do not set aside anymore. I was inspired - the possibilities were endless!

I am glad that I got "lost" in my planner today, it gave me the chance to get excited again about my first out-patient coaching experience. I scheduled in some time early next week to go back over all those search results and get my 10 week plan on paper! We'll see how it goes. In the mean time I will keep it up with the Food Network -- who knows, perhaps Rachel Ray will have something that is YUMMO for the kiddies! ---jenn

in hospital workshop

I visited CHLA tonight for an in-hospital workshop. It was an evening session, which for me, are always more quiet and usually filled with siblings and family members, rather than patients. It is for this reason that I really like evening sessions. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE doing the morning and afternoon sessions and working with the kids are are patients is always incredible, but sometimes I think that it is the other kids -- the brothers, sisters, cousins, and family friends who are overlooked. They are the ones that have to sit around and wait and not get the "attention" and sometimes I think that the in-hospital workshops are as much for them as they are for the patients. Tonight we painted CoachArt t-shirts -- lots of paint, lots of stencils, lots of MESS! The kids really loved it. The best part was that each of those kids, after having a full day at school and then sitting around in a hospital for hours chose to make their t-shirt for their sick brother or sister or cousin or friend. They used their free time to give to their loved one. I took away some very valuable things from my CoachArt experience tonight:

1) I am finally clear on the difference between Miley Cyrus and Hannah Montana (This only happened after a very in-depth conversation with three 12 year old girls, who, with all their energy, took the time to explain to me the important details on the subject. It was also during this very serious conversation that one of the girls confided in me that she really didn't think that the Jonas Brothers were that cute {gasp!} and that this was very concerning to her friends).

2) It is important to tape the stencil down before you start painting with it on a t-shirt, otherwise, it gets all over the place and your cute little bunny turns into one big blob!

3) No matter how long and hard my day has been, there is always someone else who's day has been longer and harder. That was the case with the kids I hung out with tonight, and despite that fact, each of them was so excited to make something for someone else. A lot of BIG smiles left the playroom tonight and my only hope is that they were met with equally BIG smiles when they returned with gifts to each of their separate corners of CHLA.

I leave you now with these thoughts as I get ready to call it a night while humming a Miley Cyrus song that I can not, for the life of me, get out of my head... or wait, is it a Hannah Montana song? Ugh, I'm hopeless :D!! ---jenn