I thought this week went well at Shea – we had a packed lesson, but overall it went smoothly. Carolyn conducted today’s lesson about Mastery and Future. We began by having everyone (including volunteers) create and decorate an EXPLORE! portfolio to track everything we’ve been doing this semester and keep a short journal with drawings or writing. Then, we spent the remainder of our time logging students on to waytogori.com, a website made to help students at all levels – elementary, middle, high school, college, and adult education. This site proved to be a useful and beneficial tool for students to select a possible career path, keep track of their classes, and take surveys indicating certain jobs that would be enjoyable for their specific interests. We also spoke about upcoming college visits and an upcoming PC basketball game that our group will hopefully be attending. Something that struck me today was the students’ focus and concern for their academic performance. Many of the students logged onto the school’s website which tracks their grades for each class. The students clearly took the grades seriously and tried to defend why a grade for a certain class was low. I think seeing this concern demonstrated further that these students are invested in their academics, rather than stuck in this ‘cool pose’ which Patterson argues is an issue for many students in urban schools. Overall, I think Carolyn’s lesson really outlined the ways in which goal-setting even at the high school level can ultimately affect the long-term goals that these students obviously have.
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