#shantalla

adventure calls and some men run, and this is their sad story how some get drunk on demon rum and some get drunk on glory

Every week I tutor Irish boys and girls after school in homework club. The students at Scoil Bhríde come from a low income area of Galway called Shantalla. For some of these children, they won't graduate from secondary school and others will struggle with literacy for the rest of their lives. 

Homework club takes place for an hour after school and is supervised by teachers from the school day. It's required by the Irish government that school teachers stay one extra hour to work, unpaid. With the help of Sister Margaret, a Presentation sister, homework club gives these children a place to work on their homework, something that they may not have at home. 

There are three rooms for homework club with about 14 primary school children in each one. The first day I volunteered I worked with two girls in the back of the room. When I sat down the girls were very excited to have me help, but in all honesty could have gotten on well without me. Other students in the room struggled to focus and work on their assignments. To be in homework club, students have to have repeatedly failed to complete or hand in their assignments. It was hard to understand how some of these students had failed to complete their work, but some may not have an environment suitable at home to do homework or a person able to help them.

As the weeks went on I sat with the same girls but the students increased and I began regularly working with two girls and two boys. The youngest boy, Laurence had the most trouble, mostly stemming from his attitude. He'd constantly call to me "You, come here" or order me to put his eraser, homework, etc., etc. into his bag. It wasn't until the last session that he began using my name and saying please regularly. His older brother sat next to him, and worked furiously to finish before his girl cousin who sat across from him. Many students saw homework as a competition and lost confidence when they fell behind.

My main concentration at homework club was to help focus the students on their homework and help them gain excitement about learning and school. I made a small achievement one day when Laurence refused to study his time tables for an exam the next day. As he was packing up for the day I said to him, "Let me know how your test goes." He looked at me in shock, as though I was the first person whoever showed interest or support. He said he would and that he might look over his time tables when he got home.