City Year, what time is it?!

Another Friday. In City Year Milwaukee, that means another Unity Rally down at the Sunburst sculpture, another day full of trainings (today's happens to be about how to effectively tutor math), the sharing of crazy stories from school teams, and more. For me today, and probably for the next 40 or so Unity Rallies we have, I will be thinking of my middle school boys. During after-school on Wednesdays we run a program at our school called Weekend Wednesday. This is a little more active than the other clubs we run, but we still try to incorporate an academic/CY focus. This Wednesday, we ran our own version of the Amazing Race. The students were divided into teams and had to follow 4-5 clues around the school to figure out who their CM was. At each station they had to do a task before they could get their clue, or in the case of the last clue, have free time in the gym. I was racing around with 5 middle school boys, and their last task was to perform four sets of CY Power Lunges. This is a PT move we do as a corps at Unity Rallies sometimes, and it's a fun call & response/step. Teaching it to these boys and watching them perform it and get really into it is something I'll never forget. They were watching me so intently, making sure they didn't miss a beat. With huge grins on their faces the entire time they were learning, I had them do an extra set just to test them, and it was awesome. It's always a great feeling when you're able to impart wisdom and know they understand what you're teaching them, but having them be excited about it just takes it to a whole other level. I'm starting to think I need these students just as much as they need City Year.