Diversity

Last week we had an ice cream social with a speaker about diversity. I enjoyed having the change of the way things normally run. I had never heard her talk but she presented with a practiced degree of proficiency.

One thing I took out of the class was that not everyone responds to "jokes" in the same way. As, what I would describe, a normal white, middle class American from the Midwest, I figured my response of memes and jokes would be normal. I tend to let things bounce off. A joke is a joke. There has to be either a true degree of blatantly hurtful words or actions to really get a rise out of me. Only other time would be if someone close to me issues offenses that I find hurtful. Those people should know the boundaries between right and wrong and if they don't, they will hear about it. I guess it's more of a assume good will from others type of perspective.

I learned from this lecture that not everyone feels this way. One thing I was not expecting was her take on the Daily incident. I know there was something printed which was (hopefully) unintentionally offensive. What I didn't realize happened was the disregard for the victim's feelings. The Daily most definitely should have been better proofread and after the incident, published articles that helped students see the hurt it caused those ISU students.

One thing that really bothered me about this lecture was student's responses to the picture of the woman and the man. Excuse me, but I thought the extremely negative submissions were absolutely uncalled for. The question asked "How would this person describe themselves" and people were posting statements that, had the photo been of myself, I would probably have left the room crying. It was hurtful to see those things posted. It's an interesting psychological question that should be asked, what makes individuals respond in such a way?  That social experiment makes me wonder, what responses would people post of me (if no one knew me like no one knew her.)

Ethics

Last week's presentation went very well. Great job Alex and Easton! The idea of ethics is one that plays a large role in our everyday lives. Everyone has their own background, values and experiences guiding the decisions they make and the people they are. Ethics helps keep everyone's character in check by providing a universal idea of what is right and wrong in normal society.

When asked the question in class "What does ethics look like or feel like to you?" my response was that ethics is the application of integrity. Integrity to me is honesty in every aspect of life. Not taking advantage of a situation where someone else may be hurt. Making sure that other's opportunities are equal to, if not greater than, the opportunities I have. Being a sales person, I don't think ethics is applied enough. I do my best to make sure to never lie to get a larger sale or take advantage of a customer for my own gain. I make sure that I treat every customer how I would want another sales person to treat my mother or sister. Hopefully that sales strategy (although it has been known to lose me sales and commission) will pay off in the future.

DST workday

This last week we spent most of the time discussing what was done and what still needed to be done for this Digital Story telling project. Sebastian tried to get me to do a cameo type thing where I just talk into the camera... I really really didn't want to do it. Me, on film... scary. So he took someone else. Sorry Lauren :)

Anyway it looks like we have a lot, if not all of the filming done and just need to work on editing and music. I feel my greatest contribution so far was the climbing of a tree, and screaming no in the middle of Central campus 3-4 times. :) We also found some great music to add to the background. This DST is going to be awesome! :D

Filming

Filming this last Sunday for the Digital Story telling project was a lot of fun. I was able to dress up and let the creative juices flow as the evil professor someone? (I can't remember what the script called my character but I know I was evil.) I got to climb a tree in Lago courtyard, something that was definitely the highlight of the day :) It was really great to have most of the peer mentors together being creative and having fun. After filming for a few hours we met up back at hixson for Hunger games, snacks and working on our lesson plans. Working on those lesson plans was very helpful in getting a better idea of what each should include. I feel I have a very strong handle of how to set up all 5 of my lesson plans for the portfolio.

Now just very excited to get to talk more about the coming retreat and the semester to come!

This Week Recap

Dane and I gave our Hixson presentation this week. I'm very glad that we made it through it and I feel like it went well. The hardest part for Dane and I was finding time to meet up to work on the project. Between my class and work schedule and Dane's class, new job and class trip it was difficult. I think we got a lot of good ideas presented and led a very active informative class. More than that we had fun doing it! (if you couldn't tell by our laughing toward the end! :) )

My favorite part of the presentation was the end when we received feedback. The most common response was that we rushed through, needed to practice a little more to appear more confident and to give more feedback after groups responses. Now that I have one presentation under my belt, I feel a lot more confident in how next semester might work and how I can improve my skills as a peer mentor. Thank you for all of your responses!

Tonight's dinner was not only delicious but very beneficial! Many of the things we talked about were things I had heard before but it's always good to have a refresher. The presenter was funny but still frightening. I caught myself realizing I had done something "unladylike" and got shifty eyes to make sure she didn't see!!! We all know what good etiquette is, but having to display it every once in a while makes us more comfortable when the situation truly counts. I'd much rather look silly/unladylike and ask questions in an environment that may giggle at me, but would support and encourage as well. Not quite the feedback I'd get from an interviewer.

Teamwork, Trust, Communication

Teamwork, trust and communication were three key elements that were necessary for success in last week's class. Starting with the blindfolded team member we had to navigate through an obstacle course. This was a great way to demonstrate how important it was to have another person there to help. It was critical to trust your partner. I was blindfolded first and had no idea what kind of obstacles we would have to get through. I had no choice but to literally blindly trust Carly to keep me safe. We were able to establish a very clear way to communicate back and forth (one step forward, turn ninety degrees to your left etc.) Overall the task went very well and when incorporating all three elements, we were able to complete the course without any problems!

In application with being a peer mentor next year, we will always have the support of every peer mentor for guidance and suggestion when we hit an obstacle, but the best resource for help, support, and question answering will be our partner. Being able to trust and rely on the other peer mentor will be very important. A point that was mentioned during the lesson was that together there are two heads and two people able to complete the work. Life becomes much harder when you aren't able to rely on all the resources that surround. Communication will become the center of all peer mentor relationships. Being in touch with the other person to ensure all parts of the lesson are covered and for those times when class load gets tougher for one, communicating the stresses to the other will diminish everyone's frustrations so that the class goes as successfully as possible.

Collaboration

Collaboration. This is a really good description of how last Wednesday's class went. Starting with the teamwork activity, Christina and I had the good luck to be able to play Nintendo for our activity! This was a version of Nintendo that neither of us had ever played before and it was definitely a different experience from the video games we were used to. In addition, playing one part of the game while relying on the other to play their part was difficult. It was very important to be able to work together and communicate so that each other knew exactly what the other was going to do. We were most successful when we knew when to jump, when to go, when to stay, and of course, which buttons to push to get Mario onto Yoshi! This was a great activity not only because it was fun but it forced cooperation and collaboration to complete a task and I think Christina and I did very well! :)

During the lesson we were able to take a survey about what type of problem solving we favored. As mentioned in my title, I ended up in the collaboration group. This was a good fit for myself because I feel I am able to lead when it's time to make a decision, but I'm not the type of person who will step on anyone else's opinion or views in the process of completion. Being a collaborator, I like to take a lot of other people's feelings into account and find the best solution for the whole group, even if it's not the 100% use of my idea or 100% benefit for myself. I'm very team oriented and think this group was a reflection on that fact. Team first, self second.