Shea: Week 2

This was our second time at Shea high school for the EXPLORE program. There were a few new faces at the program so that was exciting and encouraging I think for all of us to see. We introduced ourselves to the group again and then we did an activity about the different types of learners there are. We had students split up into three groups: the visual learners, the auditory learners and the kinesthetic learners. We had students participate in an activity using their learning skill and then we had students share why it is important to know what kind of learner you are and how it can help you be successful after high school. The theme of today's lesson was self-awareness and so that is how that activity fits into the theme of self-awareness, because of the importance of knowing how you learn best. Something that stood out to me today during our program was that when we were having students share their name and where they were from one student said that he was from Haiti and the rest of the high school students started to laugh at him. The student that had shared this information started to join the students and laugh at himself essentially when he observed everyone else laughing. This was surprising to me because all of the students that are in the program are minority students, and I just thought they would have known to be more respectful to the student that was sharing. This incident makes me consider the fact that maybe these students do not know about their own culture and their own family history. Another thing that happened and that was refreshing was a student remembered what one of the EXPLORE volunteers shared with the group last week. This student asked the volunteer how her test had gone and how she ended up doing on the test that she mentioned she took last week. This was such a thoughtful gesture for the student to make and made me realize that these students really care, they really want to be in the program and are motivated to learn/ grow as individuals.