Community Service Essay

My project involved helping the children in the park to better their skills in Baseball. Many of the children that went to the park had no basic knowledge of playing baseball, so it was my job to help the professional trainers in teaching them the skills required to play the sport well. The original proposal included that I had to maintain the field in playable conditions, but I went ahead and added dirt as well as passed a rake to remove holes in the infield of the baseball diamond. I also had to help the smaller children in batting practice by simply pitching them ten balls each, but I took it a step further by telling them in which way to position their arms and how to better their hitting techniques.

Although the details of each step I took to implement my project differed, the basic ones did not change. For around ten minutes (more or less, depending on the speed of the children running that day) they would jog two to three laps around the baseball field at a normal pace. Next, they would stretch out all their muscles, from their head to their feet with me demonstrating for about twenty minutes. For half an hour they'd do various running exercises that they could implement in a game, and then they'd pick a partner and warm up their arms. Following this, depending on the day of course, they'd either take their position and take groundballs or fly balls and I'd instruct them on how to catch them correctly, or they would play a "scrimmage" game between themselves we'd point out mistakes as they'd make them. Some of the other minor things I had to do were carry the equipment (such as baseballs, a pitching machine, dirt bags, etc.) to the field and back to their storage area, or if not fix the field as I stated above.

One problem that occurred during the project and frightened me a great deal was with a young child called Kenny. Kenny was 10 years old and played third base, and was pretty good compared to the rest of the kids. That day they were playing a scrimmage game, and as I said, Kenny was playing third base when another player hit a sharp groundball towards Kenny. The ball apparently hit a clump of dirt and took a bad hop, and before he could react the ball impacted with the right part of his face, especially the right eye. I was instantly out on the field, and first I checked to make sure he could open and close his eye correctly, next I checked lightly to see if he had a bone broken,