Communication!

I had a lot of fun being the discussion and class starter this past week. I thought it was a great starting experience for the position I will be in next semester. Communication is one of the most important things when leading a class. Think, pair, share is a great way to get students to think deeply about a subject and I really like when we do such things in class. I think it is also a great tool to incourage students to get to know each other. Q space is also a very effective approach. It keeps the students in the conversation, instead of just lecturing them. Lecture is something that is always not the most interesting but at some points I feel that I will have to use it next year just to get some material covered and then allow the students to do some partner learning to class discuss. Communication is something that we always do not think about as being such an important part but it definately is. I think I personally need to make sure that when I communicate to a large group that I do not come off to timid and I can be understood and respected. These are often hard things to work on but I think I need to be more direct when talking in front of the class. Hope everyone had a great weekend and look forward to seeing you on Wednesday!

Cultural Diversity

I really enjoyed this weeks topic because it really got me thinking. Lisa and I discussed that we thought tthat race, language and ethnicity would be some of the biggest shocks with started college. I think this is what was so hard for me when it comes to diversity. There is so much diversity with in diversity. I mean being at Iowa State was the first time I actually met people who have just came straight from their country to college. They have not lived in America before so their culture shock it large too. Socioeconomic was another one we thought was big. It is crazy how differently we were all raised and how we were taught to spend and use money. What we think are needs and what other people think are needs that we would consider wants. Iowa State is a very culture place. There is a lot of differences for me from where I come from since my graduating class had the first black person to ever graduate from my high school. I enjoy being in the mix of a bunch of different diversities because it makes things more well rounded. You cannot live under a rock your whole life, you should see all the other kinds of people and cultures that are out there. I have traveled to Mexico before and I loved seeing how they lived and how things work down there. I find things like that very interesting. I lived with a host family for a week and at first it was hard to communicate cuz my spanish was not the best. Luckily my host sister spoke perfect English, but no one else in her family did. She encouraged me to speak spanish and try and learn while I was there and I ended up learning a lot more that I went there with. I think it is very important that you get and see what other cultures are like, it also helps you reflect on your own and see how your culture appears to other people. I think I need to work on being more open minded. I am a fairly open minded person but there is still much room for improvement. Sometimes I do not even realise that I am not being open minded and that I already have very strong beliefs about topics.

Valentine's Day!

I really enjoyed the topic this week about getting to know ourselves and awareness. I feel like this is one really important thing about being a good mentor. You really need to know what you stand and what you are all about to be a great leader. Lately I have been doing a lot of thinking about myself and I have learned so much already this semester through this class. I do not know about the rest of the world, but when all this snow is gone it will be a lot easier to have a more exciting look upon going outside. But I am trying to remember the FISH, and pick my attitude! Have a great week everyone!

I forgot

So I totally forgot to blog yesterday! I guess I was too excited to watch the superbowl commercials! I thought that last week was a very interesting and I am so amazed how much I am learing about myself every class. I am trying to work on being more vocal and let my side be heard. I cannot wait for it to be spring! This snow is getting extremely old, but I would almost rather have it then rain! I plan on going to the Hixson committee on Thursday! I think this is a great idea and I would love to be a part of it! Have a great week everyone!

Last week of January

This week has been full of a lot of things. I feel this week I have grown a lot through all the experiences I have had through class. I really enjoyed the time at the Learning Communities Session. I went to the session about Common Reading Roundtables. I was the only student there but it turned out to be a great experience and I learned a lot about their program and shared imformation about the Hixson program to them. It was different than I had thought it would be but turned out to be equally as interesting. I thought that the retreat today was very interesting and made me think a lot. Many of the issues we talked about today are going to directly relate to things next fall and really made me start to think critically about situations. I feel that it is important to think about these things now and figure out how to deal with them. I enjoyed the session on the myers briggs evaluation. I find it so interesting how much the descriptions of the letters describe me. I really enjoy thinking about myself on a deeper level and figuring out exactly who I am because usually we do not even think about it.