After completing this project, I spent around 15 hours at Rock Island High School. I helped students on Biology, Reading, and Math assignments. I've stopped in the Study Skills room and helped some on Chemistry homework or just defining what a word means in a chapter book. My time at the Rock Island High School has impacted me immensely and left me with many memories that I will hold onto for a very long time. Going through my days tutoring, I have noticed some reoccurring themes.
1. What themes did you notice across your experiences?
One of the themes that kept occurring was perception. In the beginning, they didn't understand who we were and why we were there. They had a hard time communicating with us because we weren't like them. The students that we kept working with were further in the perception process and putting meaning to what we wanted to accomplish or there for. While others perceived us differently, had a hard time asking us for help because they thought we were just another person coming into the classroom instead of there to help. Since we just had to assume about their perceptions of us we could easily identify the perception process that we encountered of them. Our first stage of selection we wanted to focus on their reactions of our tutoring program. Watching them do their homework and if we were to correct them what their reaction would be or if they didn't quite understand the concepts being covered. This moved into the organization stage, where we made sense or meaning of them. If they had a negative reaction when they were being corrected we would make the assumption that they didn't want to learn. If they had a more positive reaction, then they would want to keep going to finish out the assignment. After organizing their reactions, we interpreted a good or bad view of them based on their reactions and could negotiate whether we wanted to keep working with the selected students. Luckily, everyone that we worked with even though they had times of struggle wanted to keep learning.
Another theme that crossed our time at Rocky was the relational development stages of coming together. In the beginning was the time of initiating and introduced ourselves to each other. This was our first initial contact. Once we left the classroom, we entered the stage of experimenting. We asked simple questions like what year in school they were or if they played any sports. After multiple visits we moved up in the intensifying stage, where our conversations became more personal. The topics were about families or where they lived previously as well as what place they liked living the best. Most responded they liked either Kentucky or Tennessee better than here in Rock Island. Next, the integrating stage, our actions toward each other had a stronger connection. We would crack jokes and even give high fives to each other when they did well on a problem that they figured out all by themselves. At times, we would even hug each other goodbye. In the bonding stage, you could see a public announcement between us because the girls would be so excited when we walked in or they would wave at us in front of everyone else. After each session, they would ask when we would be coming back again to work with them. This formed a common future that maintained the relationship we had. We didn't go through the coming apart stages so it made leaving Rock Island High School that much harder for us.
2. How will this experience shape your future interpersonal interactions?
With all the time spent at Rock Island High School, I hope that all my experiences and memories will help shape my future interpersonal interactions. With perception, I can see that we all have different perceptions of each other and we need to learn through experience instead of be quick to assume things about another person. We shouldn't be quick to judge but be aware of those perceptions we have and not let them affect our behavior towards one another. Having a change of perception takes time and it can't change after experiencing something for one day. It takes time to fully understand something. I hope to give anyone and everyone the time of day not based on pre-judgements but giving them a chance so I can learn about them and put meaning to it. Also, with the relational development stages, it takes time to move up the ladder. You have to have that first initial contact before moving on to more personal questions. It takes two people to have that relationship, not just one. I hope for my future career in teaching, I can have that close connection with my students so they have a sense of comfort and ability to speak out in my classroom. Between the processes of perception and relational development, it takes time to conquer and reach the highest potential of those processes. Learning about these concepts and experiencing firsthand with them with this service-learning project will help me become more aware of them in my future interactions.
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