By: Emily Gamble
This year my internship was with the Briscoe County Extension Office. Compared to my other internships this one was the busiest and most hectic yet. But it has also been the most beneficial of all too. I have done so many things throughout this internship it could probably take up all the words you can use so I will just summarize the best I can. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday I lead the Low Impact exercise Class for senior citizens. We would do exercises to boost their modality and joint strength. Every day in the morning I also weeded and watered the community garden.
At the beginning of the summer every Wednesday we did the Summer Reading Program. We read 2-3 books and played a game, made a craft, and ate a snack that went with the book’s theme. We usually played games like Simon says and other fun games. Along with made snacks like animals to go with animal books. For the crafts, some examples we made were rainbow fish to go along with the book Rainbow fish and caterpillars to go along with the book the Hungry Caterpillar. I also did a lot of office work this year.
Like making and mailing the monthly newsletters, checking the mail, organizing the storage room, going through the contest boxes, making flyers for upcoming events, and planning events throughout the year. One event we planned was the back-to-school 4-H enrolment party which we are holding at the city pool. I also helped do all the paperwork and hair pulling samples at the summer cattle and sheep validation. Along with helping set up and check in all the guests at the cattle producer’s meeting. I also got to help with the monthly field evaluations which we just looked at crops and fields and reported them.
I also helped at two 4-H day camps. The first one was the Caprock Canyons Camp where I lead a session of water games. We played games like water balloon volleyball and drip drip drop. I also lead the water erosion trailer session at the 10 County Camp. The erosion table demonstrates how water erodes the land and crops. The biggest thing I did all summer was the County Celebration. 4-H players a big part of the Celebration so I was a super buy. We had to sell cow patty and chicken drop bingo tickets as well as put it on.
We were in charge of the rodeo concession stand so we had to make all the food and work it all weekend. We also had to clean and hang up all the donor signs for the rodeo. 4-H also has a float in the parade so I was responsible for decorating it and riding on the float with the kids. Overall I was super busy but learned a lot. Most of the thing I did throughout this internship was a success besides a few mishaps but nothing major. A few of the mishaps were overscheduling, making too much or not enough of stuff. rushing to plan events, and getting sunburn and heat exhaustion. I feel like I overall improved on my goals I learned how to better communicate with adults. I did this by talking to the parents and adults about what was going on during the year and informing them. I found out that it was not that I was bad at it, it was that I was scared to mess up. I think that I stepped up my role in leadership by getting more involved in all I do. I did get to connect and reach out to other agents and 4-H leaders that helped me out with planning events and my future. I feel like my goals might not be finished but they were all worked on. I just want to thank you all and my community for the amazing opportunity and learning experience. I cannot wait to use what I have learned in college and in my life.
