Communication is KeyIn my time as an Orientation Leader, I was able to work with one of the most diverse groups of leaders on campus and meet and interact with a variety of incoming students from all majors and backgrounds each week over the summer. Through this experience, I learned a lot about myself, but also about others. Through conversations with incoming freshmen, I was able to see their stories and what brought them to be where they are today, as students of USC. This looked different for each student because every one of them came from a different background and had a different story to tell, giving them all different reasons for being here and goals for where they want to be 4 years later when they graduate and go off into the world. It was interesting to hear all of their stories and learn from their perspectives, while also learning and growing from working with my own team.
During our orientation training, we had a diversity training during which we did an activity where we all filled out worksheets about our lives and the privileges we possess. These sheets were filled out anonymously and then swapped with other students around the room. We then did an activity where we took a step forward or back if certain qualities applied to the person on our sheet to see where this person lied in regards to privilege in comparison to others in the room. After this, we shared our thoughts, and one of my coworkers who was a black male said that he was surprised to find that he was the farthest back in the room, because when he got his paper and saw it was a white female he expected to be towards the front, with a lot of privilege. This showed that you don’t always get the full picture just looking at a person from the outside, it is what is on the inside and the combination of their experiences that makes them who they are. Through discussions and activities such as this, I was able to grow as a leader and as a person because I was able to learn to look deeper into the people I met and get to know them on a more personal level rather than just creating surface-level connections. You never know someone else’s story, and what you can learn from them. In EDRD 500: Content Area Literacy PK-12, we talked about the importance of differentiating instruction to meet the individual needs of our students. To know how to meet a particular student’s needs you have to go beyond a surface-level understanding and really get to know them and figure out what makes them tick, what interests them and how you can use this information to best engage them in the classroom. This is especially important in large classes where you cannot always give each student individualized attention all the time. You have to know what level all of your students are at with the material and how they learn best in order to present in a way that engages and makes sense to each one of them. This concept does not just apply in the classroom, however; every person you meet has a different story, different interests, and different skills and you have to know how to relate to them, and be open to them to truly get to know them. This was also reflected in the orientation small-group curriculum. In just 2 days we were tasked with getting to know our students, their values and backgrounds to help them adjust to their new home and see how the tenets of the Carolinian Creed would apply to their lives over the next four years. While all of our small group meetings were important, we learned the most about our students during the third small group, which we called the continuum activity. In this activity, we presented the students with a variety of scenarios and asked them to move around the room to show whether they agreed, had a neutral stance, or disagreed with each scenario. These scenarios spanned topics such as roommates, cheating, alcohol and drug use, mental health, discrimination, sexual assault and other tough topics they may be faced with throughout their college experience. After students had made their decision on the topic we asked them to share why they were standing where they were. While many students had differing opinions and did not always go the way I would go on an issue it was still interesting to see why they chose to stand where they were, what beliefs they had, and why they held that opinion. I was able to see from a variety of perspectives on these topics, and many shed light on ideas I would never have even considered. None of their answers were wrong but instead, their lives had led them to form different beliefs and see the topics from a different perspective than I had when I stood in their shoes as a freshman. That is why it is important to be open to learning from others, you may not always agree with what they say, but you can learn to look at the world from a new perspective by seeing it through their eyes. Another aspect of orientation that impacted my experience was that even though we were presenting the same curriculum to our students every week, we were paired with a different partner each time. It was interesting to see how our different personalities meshed as a team, and how different the material could be presented and discussed each time. It was interesting to see how my peers presented information in different ways than I may have thought to initially. By watching and playing off of their energy I was able to grow in my own skills as a leader. Also, just as we had to differentiate literacy materials to students of different levels in my EDRD class, as shown in my reflection on the course below, we had to differentiate the way we presented curriculum to different small groups at orientation. One of the groups I had was very enthusiastic, and practically bouncing off the walls, so me and my partner, Chris, taught them through a variety of physical games and challenges and we kept our activities high energy so they wouldn’t lose engagement. On the other hand, the group I had when working with my friend Brett was very shy and mellow, so we had to approach them from a different angle and spent more of our time just chatting and getting to know them to bring them out of their shells and make them feel more comfortable. Just as you have to approach people from different perspectives in the classroom, you have to approach people from different perspectives in life. No two people or two experiences are exactly the same, and to truly be open to new experiences and be a lifelong learner you have to always be open to new experiences and ways of thinking. By taking the time to learn from other’s experiences you can grow in your own understanding of yourself and the beautifully diverse world we live in. You never know how a person could change your life if you take a moment to make an impact on theirs. |
Artifacts
WTC: EDRD Project Rationale and Reflection | |
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