Resources

This past week was a very exciting one for me! Megan and I were teaching and of course that was my first time teaching the class and I was super nervous but everything seemed to go very well and you guys seemed to like the activity so that was a lot of fun! Thank you guys for being so awesome!!

Anyways, we were going over various resources on the campus that we have all personally used and I was surprised to hear some that I’ve never heard of before! But that’s just what we need to do in the fall is push those resources not as well known to the students.  I would have definitely used the on call nurse thing if I had known about it – good job Coreen for listing that because I think that was new for all of us to hear about (if not then it was just me haha)!

We thought it would be better to focus more on the resources available on our campus rather focusing on the book during our class time and when we did the quiz (I liked to call it jeopardy) everyone seemed to really enjoy it, and everyone got the answers correct with the hints so I would say I was very impressed, good job!

If class will be anything like it was Wednesday next year then I’m really looking forward to it now! J

Learning Styles

This week’s class was very interesting for me because I've never really known which learning style I preferred.  I know, I know it sounds silly but if you look at my results from the quiz we took in class I had two 5’s and two 3’s, so I suppose I prefer all four at some point, I'm not really sure what to think of it.  I remember when we went over this last year in our recitation class too and it was pretty much the same, no one style specifically stood out for me.  I like to think my learning styles are kinesthetic and visual because that’s how I learned best when doing my jobs back at home and at Hawthorn.  After I watch someone do something and then try it out for myself I feel like the more I do it the more I’ll get better at it and I like it that way.  I don’t think I can learn just by reading something, I feel like I work better when after if I do read it I apply it because doing whatever makes me learn better.  I like hands on activities. 

I’ll use a past experience as an example.  So when I was younger I used to dance, and when you’re learning a new routine we always watch the teacher and have them show it to us then we repeat what they do because just reading the whole dance on paper would be hard for all of us to pick up.  So I guess I’ve grown up with learning how to do that, watching someone do something then putting myself in their shoes and applying it myself.  I really hope that makes sense because it made sense in my head!

We did a certain activity last year in our recitation and I don’t remember literally everything but I want to try to do that activity with my students next year and hopefully they will be able to tell which learning style they prefer best.

Leadership

This week Brady and Josh led the class with the discussion over Leadership.  With leadership being such a broad topic I liked what we covered in class and how to go about this in the fall with our mentees.

One of the few things we discussed in class was seating arrangements.  I was taken aback by it because I have never really thought about how seating could affect our leadership but as we talked about it, it definitely made more sense.  I would say if I’m not presenting something and no one else is either my favorite seating arrangement(s) would be sitting in the circle or the living room one.  I like them because to me it seems like a relaxed environment and everyone can see each other and it makes discussion go very well. 

It was also brought up how we are to talk to our mentees in the fall during recitation and even the large lecture.  It seemed to be a touchy subject to use sarcasm with the mentees, but I’m a very sarcastic person in general so I think I may use it next year but use it lightly and be overpowering.  I know sometimes people don’t catch onto sarcasm as easily as others and maybe not take the people who use it as serious.  I hope I don’t get to that point, and if I do happen to use it, do it like Easton mentioned in class where he was doing it to call out certain people for not paying attention or what have you.

Overall, I’m not going to be able to know how to go about doing things until I meet and get to know who I’m teaching and how I’m going to go about differences within the group.  But as I learn everything in this class I’ll be able to apply everything to the best of my abilities.  

Understanding Group Process

This past Wednesday Kat and Tyler taught class, and it was a very good time!  To be quite honest the activity they had us do was quite difficult to understand what we were supposed to do at the beginning!  But eventually we were all able to work together and finally get what we were supposed to do.  This goes to show that when we all work together we are able to accomplish what we need to do; if one of us was confused or multiple it wouldn’t have been able to work out as smoothly as it did.  Look back at what we were all doing at the beginning of the activity towards the end.  We were a mess in the beginning, but once we all started to understand what we were supposed to do we finally began to work together and we successfully accomplished catching each other’s sticks and then passing them to each other as well. 

This is going to be able to tie in greatly next fall and for our future.  Us as the peer mentors are going to have to be able to work together and successfully doing so we will be able to work strongly as a team and then that will carry onto our mentees that will see that and hopefully they will work strongly with their group members in and outside of the Hixson class.  Working as a group should also help us as well outside of this class.  Of course we’ve all had those good and bad experiences of working together in a group, and no matter what although we all wish those experiences were good we are going to come across those that are bad, even after we graduate college.  Hopefully with all of this knowledge that we are learning within this class and between all of the good and bad experiences we are able to distinguish what will be a good group and good teamwork but also we will know how to make it better if something goes wrong.

ISCORE

Today I had the opportunity to go to ISCORE, the Iowa State Conference on Race and Ethnicity.  I honestly had never heard of this before seeing it in the syllabus and if I had clearly I wasn't paying attention because I don’t think I’ll be able to forget this experience.  I went to the opening message and a session right after.  I liked the beginning because we got to see and hear others experiences of NCORE which is the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity.  The video shared people’s experiences and what they had learned almost each day they were at the conference.  We also got to hear from President Leath (I spelled it wrong on twitter earlier, my bad!), and from Mary Jo Gonzales, whom has a PhD and was named as a Women Impacting ISU for her role in mentoring students and was honored for “cultivating a community focused on student success.”  She talked about how she grew up and how that has impacted her life, and how she got to where she is now.  One thing she brought up was an item of food and she said how when she sees it, has it, whatever it takes her back to her childhood and all the memories that came along with it.  She then had the people at the tables discuss what they’re favorite food from their childhood was and why.  In the end the connection wasn't necessarily the food item but the fact that your family was most likely together and happy during the time you were having said food item and that you cherish those memories of being together; that is what I got out of it anyway.  Those items obviously change being from different races and ethnicities.

After the morning address I went to the session Open Discussion on How A Central, Well-Funded Diversity Focused Office May Help ISU.  The majority of the people there were faculty and staff, very few students so part of me felt out of place.  However, our input was very important in the discussion because they wanted student’s views on some things.  We talked about how we could get the university together as a whole understand different cultures and how to go about teaching them and help them understand.  My group talked about having more activity fairs about diversity so others would be able to go and learn more about them and not just stick to judging and assuming things about people when in reality just because one person does it doesn't mean everyone does it.  I like to relate this back to how Europeans see Americans.  They think we all talk with a southern accent and talk about getting cheeseburgers and french-fries all the time.  We can’t just label people on what we see and hear from others necessarily, but actually take the time to get to know them and accept them for who they are.