Yohe – Reflection 3

One of the major aspects of my internship at ACH Clear Pathways has been helping with homework, which I have yet to go into detail for in my blog posts. Initially, my focus was on the art program aspect of the internship, learning how to assist and develop students in a group and as a whole. However, I’ve come to learn that this is only possible when there is a fundamental understanding of everyone’s individual needs. Understanding the thought process and emotions of each of the students is only going to make the transition to teaching and leading a group of students easier, as you will be better capable of understanding personal needs and the strengths and weaknesses of collaboration. For example, there is one student in the program that I assist with that is great at working with and in group settings, but often struggles when forced to work on their own. In this specific case, when doing their homework, the student would tend to get distracted and would prefer to talk to others and work with classmates to get the work done. In other situations, this type of problem-solving would be proactive and beneficial, but due to the setting requiring their own input to develop their growing mind, this cannot be the case. As a response, I try to get the student back on track, as I know that these actions are not due to a lack of understanding the material, but rather due to outside influences and how they respond to them. In trying to refocus the student, they get emotional, and it was then that I began to understand that their response was because of their preference to work on other things – to be collaborative and interact with their peers. Upon noticing this, I began to restructure my approach, explaining how the quicker the more tedious work gets done, the quicker that the student can get to doing work they would prefer to be doing. This got through to the student, and they were able to complete their homework without any more distractions. Using this knowledge, I was able to better gauge their interactions in the group setting – seeing how they (as well as the rest of the group) interacted and worked through difficult problems was a way for me to better understand what is necessary of myself and how I engage with these students. By knowing the needs and personal development of each individual in the group, I know how to better be a leader for them.

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