First Three Visits to Lifemoves Homeless Shelter

When deciding to work with Lifemoves homeless shelter for our PACT project, we created two goals. Our first goal was to make a difference in some meaningful way in the lives of the kids that we worked with and our second goal was to gain a greater understanding about how poverty affects families who are served by the Shelter Network. We would be working weekday evenings with kids, playing outdoor activities with them and keeping them entertained while their parents attended mandatory workshops provided by Lifemoves which is a homeless shelter that provides the people staying in the shelter with job help because they are completely focused on the full experience of the shelter not just giving people a place to stay. They have many shelters all over the bay area some for families and some for single people with no families. 

When we first met the children, we agreed that their enthusiasm and energy were mind-blowing! All the kids, even after long days at camp and with their families, were still excited to do sports activities with us and get to know us. We played the basketball game “Horse” with all of the kids on our first day, and we got to know a girl named Anna while playing. She told us how going outdoors was her favorite part of the day, because it was relaxing and fun; clearly she was grateful we were there. Later on that evening, we had to settle a dispute between two eight-year-old boys who were fighting over the rules of a Four Square game. We explained that instead of screaming at one another, it would be more valuable to try to clarify the rules for future play and they asked us to help settle the outcome. Afterwards when we resolved their dispute, we joined them to finish the game. 

We believe we made a genuine impact on all the families' lives by donating our time and attention to work with the kids. When the kids were with us, we taught them fun games, the idea of sportsmanship, and teamwork. Meanwhile, the parents got some much needed free time to learn about ways to escape poverty and help their families in the future. Though at times we agreed it was very sad to witness the tough lives these families were experiencing, we gained a sincere appreciation for the efforts of the Lifemoves homeless shelter. The experience has been very rewarding so far, and we continue to look forward to hanging out with the kids more throughout the school year.