I have been a military child for my entire life. I’ve lived in five states on the East Coast, across the Atlantic in England, in the desert of Southern California, and finally, I’m home in Vermont. Moving roughly every two years has been difficult; but, despite this challenge, my “military child” experience has given me many positive advantages. I’ve been exposed to many different cultures, places, and people, and this has broadened my worldview and given me the tools I need to be a successful college student.
Moving to a new school, a new state, or even a new country presents both obstacles and opportunities. It isn’t easy to say goodbye to friends, learn to adapt to new places, and balance schoolwork. However, despite this adversity, I’ve learned the value of resilience and independence, and these lessons have made me a stronger individual. Contrarily, I’ve been fortunate enough to get the chance to travel through Europe and across America. Exploring new places is one of my favorite things to do, and traveling has greatly bolstered my confidence and communication skills. For instance, while in Europe, I was able to order dinner for my family at a restaurant by speaking in
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This allowed me to take classes I wouldn’t have been able to take had I stayed in one place. Going to so many different schools has been challenging; however, I’ve learned many valuable skills. For example, during my junior year, I moved to a new state during the second quarter. This was particularly difficult for me because I had been living in California at the time, and Vermont was not only different in scenery, but also in culture. I had to adapt to the New England way of life, maintain my grades, and get accustomed to a completely different body of people. I’ve learned to make friends wherever I go and keep a level head. Flexibility is one of my greatest
Military families live all across the United States and more than likely you know at least one or you, yourself, are actually a military family. In the excerpt from “Military Children and Families” by Nansook Park, Park argues that greater attention needs to be established by psychologists towards military families in order to implement more effective programs to help support military families. To support her argument, Nansook Park uses an effective amount of pathos and logos, citing credible psychological studies and along with pathos and logos, she uses ethos as well.
I’m a military child. Change was instilled in me since my birth in Spain. My childhood was spent briefly in Europe, the east coast of the U.S, and eventually the Midwest. This change of scenery, schools, friends, and just about everything else in my life led me to be the person I am today. Travelling was amusing and I enjoyed change of pace every couple of years, but it wasn’t easy. I learned early on that getting attached to people wasn’t a good idea and should be avoided in preparation for the next move. This led me to being an incredibly shy child who couldn’t open up to people. The world I come from is an adventurous but problematic one. When I concluded making friends would assist with each transition I found myself too terrified to attempt
Now, here I am, a junior at Mineola High School, and I feel ready for whatever will come after high school. As I try to figure out what I want to do with my future, I now know how much I love travelling and people and hope my career includes that. Moving helped me see my flaws and strengths. It helped me recognize that I am sometimes too diffident and circumspect. While in Mineola, I managed to ameliorate my social skills enough to be voted by my classmates as “Class Favorite” and have also joined activities I normally would have been too shy to take part
Military life can be a big amount of stress for children. There is multiple deployments where they go through long separations from their parents. Children even could experience a parent getting injured or possibly a death. That all is the reality for children who has a parent in the active duty military(website 1). There is such a huge impact on children’s mental health and high rates of trauma from them experiencing their parents going on deployments. More than two million American children have had a parent deploy to Iraq or Afghanistan. At least 19,000 children have had a parent wounded in action and over 2,200 children have lost a parent in Iraq or Afghanistan(website 1). After all of this occurring in their lives, it then causes a huge change in the child. These changes are lashing out in anger, changes in school performance,
The need to be able to adapt is necessary for every military child since conditions will not always be perfect. Sometimes orders are cut short and a family may have to move before they expected. Two of the most influential years in shaping my background were the two years I spent living in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba where adaptability was of the utmost importance. For example, since everything was shipped to the base on on a barge and sometimes the barge was delayed, the local store would often be out of many products. If one needed something that was out of stock, he or she was simply out of luck and had to make due with what there was. Furthermore, the small student population made for small class sizes sizes and limited resources but despite this we attended school everyday and made the most of what we had. Despite of all these challenges, I thoroughly enjoyed my time there and was adaptable in order to adjust to all the changes from the United
In Ernest Hemingway’s short story, “Soldier’s Home”, a young man named Krebs is unable to relate to his mother and home life after he returned from the First World War. After Krebs saw death and destruction in the wars most bloody battles, he returns home where his parents try to get him back to his normal routines. His view of the world has changed drastically since the war. He no longer feels love in his heart and cannot lie to his mother when she asks if he loves her. One of the famous lines Hemingway wrote, “Krebs looked at the bacon fat hardening on his plate.” Like bacon his heart has been hardened by what he had seen in World War I and he knew he must get far away from his parents to be able to get his life back
Among the many populations that occupational therapists serve are military veterans who have bravely risked their lives for our country. Whether they are veterans of World War I or II, the Vietnam War or the current Global War on Terrorism, they often return home from combat with various injuries, illnesses and impairments. Some common conditions that they may face include polytrauma, traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder. Our military veterans must learn how to reintegrate into society as they transition back to civilian life, which can prove difficult for many reasons. They may experience difficulty readjusting to life at home, school, work or within the community.
One thing that all military installations offer to families is a mock deployment line. A mock deployment line is a wonderful thing for a child to experience. During a mock deployment line, the child will go through all of the steps their parent does when preparing to deploy. It cannot be stressed enough to parents the importance of informing their children’s caregivers and teachers that a parent will be deploying. Doing so is a vital step in helping the child cope with the upcoming separation. The child’s teacher, once informed of an upcoming deployment will help the child cope by incorporating activities such as reading books where a family member is taking a long trip, or talking with all the children about how they feel and why they feel the way they do into their lesson plans. Parents need to make sure they do not put off telling children of the deployment, letting their children know about the deployment as soon as possible will provide them the opportunity to become involved in preparing for the separation. Children will want to have many conversations with their parents about the deployment; parents need to make sure that they keep the discussions honest, straightforward, and factual (Clash, 2008).
Since children go through so many social, emotion, and educational needs the "Military Child in Transition and Deployment" website was formed to offer advice and resources for changing schools to military children and their parents to make their moves easier. For the youths, the site teaches youths to the importance of having keepsakes while their parents are deployed. For the teens, the site can help provide advice on colleges that would normally be provided by a parent (Desjarlais, 2004).
In the United States, soldiers are currently returning home from war broken and scarred. While some physical wounds are clearly visible others are often hidden/invisible to the naked eye, but men and women proudly wear these wounds as a badge of courage and honor for protecting our nation. These men and women come home rightfully expecting help, assistance and care and get hit with the reality of poor care from the Veteran Health Administration and Department of Defense.
To start off with, as a transfer student coming from a local state college to the University of Central Florida was a huge change. It was a different change because it was the first time I was going to be away from home. I have spent the last twenty-one years under my parent’s wings and it was time to grow and flourish, but that is much easier said than done, it would also be much easier if I was not such a shy person. But my decision
Your key challenge in a leadership position is taking care of the Soldiers entrusted to your care. Soldiers are our nation’s most important military asset. The Leader who sends the message that Soldiers don’t really matter will generally not be as successful in the long-run as the Leader who is genuinely serious about taking care of his/her Soldiers.
Twenty-six years ago I a 17-year-old boy joined the United States Army. I served my country faithfully for 22 years, two months and four days; I served in the Transportation Corps. My time in the army was a special period in my life. I gain a lot of life experiences as well as professional ones; the military shaped and molded me into the husband, father son, and brother that I am today. During my service, I grew up and learned several life lessons that would serve me well in and out of the army. To get a real understand on how the military shaped me into the person, I am today; I must first give you some insight into the person I was before I left for basic training. I graduated high school in 1991 just four months’ shy of my 18th birthday;
Deployment and integration are one the greatest challenges military families and children have to face on a daily basis. When a family member deploys or reintegrates within the entire family, it not only affects the service member but it affects the entire family. Deployment can often lead to families and children, experiencing a negative mental health outcomes and compromised wellbeing. Bello (2015) found that most families and children (80.5% required less than one month to adjust to the return of their deployed parent (Bello, 2015). Accordingly, the families and children are often quick to adjust to having their family member back in the home. Interestingly, discoveries are surprising in light of the fact that when contrasted to another family, the discoveries are definitely unique. Boberiene (2014) found that three out of every four families feel that reintegration after the first three months is the most stressful phase of a deployment (Boberiene, 2014). This is because the family experiences many emotions while the member is away.
I’ve lived in three different states and attended six schools over the past eight years. Relocating from Texas to Michigan, and later Michigan to Georgia were big adjustments for me. I missed my friends and close relatives. However, I knew I had to make the best of my circumstances. Through these experiences, I began to learn to be more flexible, become more open-minded to different traditions, and be adventurous in different parts of the country-I played volleyball, joined a dance team, and even went skiing! At school, I also focused on excelling in my classes and challenge myself like I did when adjusting to a new town.