Blog Post #9: Resilient Kids

I really enjoyed watching the Resilient Kids video and learning more about this organization. I believe that it is EXTREMELY important for kids (and people of all ages) to practice mindfulness in every aspect of their lives. By feeling centered, in control of yourself and your feelings I believe is very important to be successful.

The video mentioned that teachers many times tell students to “calm-down” but if you are telling a child to “calm-down” that does not know how to do so it does not do any good for either the student or the teacher. Resilient Kids teaches students and teachers skills to build focus, balance and self-confidence which are very important qualities to hold.

What I also enjoyed about what Resilient Kids does is that they work with teachers and build lessons that fit within the curriculum. I thought this was very interesting because they are able to teach mindfulness and use the curriculum the teachers have to teach. I believe this is a great organization that helps youths, teachers, schools and everyone involved! 

Blog Post #8: RW Documentary

After watching this documentary it was very interesting to see how students from different cultures felt in schools. Middle and high school are difficult years for youth because they are trying to find out who they are and where they fit in and adding being “different” to that mix must be even more difficult. What I found most shocking was what some of the teachers said to their students. As a future youth worker I can’t imagine telling the youth I work with “I’m not here to be your friend”, “because your parents dropped out of school and had you young, the same thing is going to happen to you” or not letting a youth wear a head covering because of her religious beliefs. Comments like those only hurt students’ self-esteem, education and will keep them guarded.

How this documentary is going to help me work with youths across cultures is by taking the extra step to learn about the different cultures of the youths I’ll be working with. I think by understanding where they come from helps you better understand them which will only help lead to becoming a better youth worker. Also, depending on the type of program I’d be working in, I would set up a cultural day so that all the youths could explain where they came from and what about their cultural identity is important to them. I think by doing activities like this it will show the youths you care and are willing to go the extra mile to get to know them.

   

This is an activity I found to teach about diversity 

Event #2~ Promising Practices

My second event was the Promising Practices conference here at RIC. The theme of this conference was STEM Education in Urban Environments. The keynote speaker was Dr. Christopher Edmin who is a leading scholar in Urban Education. What Dr. Edmin spoke about in his keynote was how we need to teach the who are students in our hip-hop generation differently.We can not use the traditional teaching ways that were used on us when we were in school.

During the keynote address I remembered one of the articles we have read in class, Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants by Marc Prensky. The topic Dr. Edmin spoken about had the same idea we read about and discussed in class. We cannot teach students who are in a digital age the same way we were taught because times have changed. Dr. Edmin spoke about how some of his students could rap Newton’s Laws of Motion but when it came time to write it on paper they would not be able too. In a ‘traditional’ educational setting the student would get the description of Newton's Law of Motion wrong if he or she rapped it but if we were teaching for the hip-hop generation it would be correct.

What I took from keynote address was a more general theory. That we as youth workers need to remember that each youth is different and learns differently. We cannot use old techniques to teach new students. Also, that it is important to incorporate what our youth are interested in.  For example, when reviewing for an exam instead of sitting in front of the classroom asking questions to each student turn that into a game of Jeopardy; have teams, use real bells and have prizes. Students will be more engaged with the review and will retain more information. Learning should be fun for youth and the more they are engaged to the material the more successful they will do.  

This is a video of Dr.Christopher Edmin at a TED Talks

Event #1~ Stress Night at Bristol County House of Corrections and Jail

My first Youth Development event was a stress night at Bristol County House of Corrections and Jail. I went to this stress night because my boyfriend is in the academy to become a corrections officer and they had a stress night to talk about the stresses of the job and to tour the facility. While I was touring the facility and saw some of the inmates I kept thinking to myself about how they got here.

The section Schools in the Costello reading kept running through my mind while walking through the facility. The Schools section speaks about the programs and resources in schools and the conflicts between what youths need and what the schools are able to provide. If the men and women in this facility had programs in their schools growing up maybe they would not be incarcerated now.With schools being least accountable to students many students fall through the cracks and the unfortunate reality is that some end up in facilitates like Bristol County House of Corrections. 

While in Bristol County House of Corrections these men and women have educational, vocational, religious and inmate work programs as well as substance abuse and counseling that they are able to participate in while incarcerated. With these programs are in place so the inmates are able to better themselves and have a better chance to be successful once they get out.

I went to this stress night to see where my boyfriend is going to be working and not as one of my events. But while there it made me think of the youth advocacy, counseling and probation aspect of youth development. There are many young people incarcerated and just because they are in a facility does not mean they do not need our help both while they are there and when returning to society.

This is an article about the imperativeness to transform juvenile justice

systems into effective educational systems

This is a video about what a probation officer does daily

Blog Post #7: Chapter 2 by Nakkula

After reading chapter 2, Identity in Context, by Nakkula context mapping was one of the major themes. Context mapping is the way in which you act depending upon the environment you are in. For example, how I act with my friends is different than when I am in class and vice versa. What Mitch asks Julian to do is write down the environments he is in everyday, the people he comes across and what he thinks people expect from him in those environments.  Lastly, Mitch asks Julian to write his feeling down when he is in each of those environments.

My Context Map:

RIC: Student, Intern, Classmate, YDEV

Work (CVS): Supervisor, Co-Worker, Team Member, Customer Service

Personal Life: Daughter, Sister, Granddaughter, Niece, Cousin, Friend, Girlfriend

Four Identities:

Foreclosed Identity: Is when an individual has committed to a life direction or way of being without exploring it carefully and without experimenting with alternatives (Nakkula, Chapter 2). Example- Being religious just because your family is.
Diffuse Identity: Is a state in which there has been little exploration or active consideration of a particular identity and no psychological commitment to one (Nakkula, Chapter 2). Example- Doing/liking something just because your friends do.

Moratorium: This is a developmental state in which one actively explores roles and beliefs, behaviors and relationships, but refrains from making a commitment (Nakkula, Chapter 2).

Achieved Identity:  Occurs when the identity crisis is resolved and the commitment to the selected identity is strong (Nakkula, Chapter 2).  I believe this is the GOAL for everyone--> discovering who you truly are. 

Blog Post #6: Chapter 1 by Nakkula

After reading this chapter by Nakkula it was very eye opening. When students act out in class many educators don’t try to see why they are acting out, they simply just discipline them.  They believe this will solve the problem but it doesn't. If educators took the time to speak to the student that is acting up and form a better relationship with them they might find out why they are acting up and their educational experience will only get better.

What I also enjoyed about this chapter is when they spoke about scaffolding and the zone of proximal development (ZPD). I believe scaffolding is an extremely important part of education because not all students learn the same way and lessons must be changed in different ways so that each student learns they best they can. The ZPD is another important part of education because this is where the most possibility for growth occurs for students. Educators strive for students to learn in their ZPD because if not students maybe become bored or frustrated because they aren't learning to their full capacity.

As a future youth worker I need to make sure that if a child is acting up in a program to make sure to speak to them and figure out what is really going on and not be quick to judge. Also when education comes to play I must make sure to remember that not all students learn the same and remember to always aim to educate in the ZPD.  

Blog Post #5: Egg Drop Experience

I really enjoyed the egg drop experiment because it was a hands on activity. I learn better when I am doing hands on experiments so this activity really caught my attention. Before we received our box I was curious to see what materials we had to work with but once I saw our box I automatically knew we had a good chance of our eggs surviving the drop. My group and I got really invested with the experiment and we wanted to make sure our babies (eggs) did not die. All our eggs survived the drop and I had a lot fun with the activity and my group which I thought made the activity even better.

How I think the egg drop experiment connects back to the Ullucci reading about poverty is that each box represents different towns that have different resources. For example, my group was a ‘richer community’ because we had the most eggs out of all the groups and had the best resources like marshmallows and bubble wrap.  This represents how some communities have better school systems which provide more resources for the students living within those communities verses a community that has a lower economic status who’s schools do not have many resources (the box with paper, feathers and a condom).

What I also thought was interesting and did not realize until our discussion about the experiment was that the groups that had the better materials were in the same room and the groups that had the not so good materials were together in the same room. This made we think how sometimes higher economic status communities are usually located together, like Barrington and Bristol, while lower economic communities, like Providence and Pawtucket,  are close together as well. Because of how lower economic communities are set up it can make it harder for community to grow and be better because their neighbors are also struggling unlike the higher economic community where they may want to compete with their surrounding communities to be the best of the best. Overall, I really enjoyed this experiment and it gave me a new view on poverty.

Blog Post #4: Ullucci

The claims Ullucci makes about the impact of poverty on youth today is that today’s youth are struggling more than ever in school because of their socioeconomic status. By having a lower socioeconomic status affects many things in youth’s lives, like their parents having low paying jobs and living in rundown homes because it’s the best they can afford. These run down homes are typically located in rundown communities that usually have a high crime rate.

Not only is their home environment struggling, their schools are as well because they are located in the same communities. Poverty does not just affect youth’s home environment but also their well-being. Youth’s from low income backgrounds are less likely to receive medical care, which leads to many untreated illnesses that affects youth’s school performance.  

How poverty might impact a youth development space is that youth may not be interested in an after school program because they do not enjoy their regular school day. Also they might not be enough money to support a program in a low socioeconomic community. The type of community I imagine myself working in is an urban community because I have done practicums in two Providence schools and one school in Newport and I really enjoyed being in that kind of environment.  However, I am not opposed to working in any kind of community and feel no matter the community every youth would benefit from a youth development space!

This is a video of how poverty impacts youth

Blog Post #3: "Schools" ~ Costello 2001

After reading the introduction and my assigned section, Schools, in the Costello article it made me realize that there is a disconnect between our students and the schools they attend. Like spoken about in the introduction, in this country the bulk of funding that goes towards youth welfare is focused on preventive or ameliorative programs. These programs are very important but it does not target the needs of all the youth in the community.

The key ideas in the ‘Schools’ section of the article is that youths spend more time in school than any other organization. However there is a conflict between the needs of youth and what schools provide. Similar to the Prensky article, educators need to change with the needs of students they are educating. This may seem like an easy task but educators have many people they have to answer too and must also follow rules.

In each case study they spoke about how a certain school overcame a certain category they had against them for example school size. Public schools are usually large in size because it is cheaper to run and you need less administers. But because of the large student populations it makes for a less personal experience between students, teachers, the principle and administers. Even though this may be true in some cases it is not true for all.

At the John F. Kennedy High School in the Bronx has a student population of over 5,000 students. Out of the 5,000 students, 2,000 have an hour long commute, by choice, and attendance rates are high. The principle of John F. Kennedy developed a sense of community and belonging despite the size. This school is the perfect example of overcoming the obstacle of school size and having a personal relationship with students and meeting their needs.

What the case studies have taught me is that even when the odds are against us they is always a way to overcome and push through those odds. 

Blog Post #2: "Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants" & "Do They Really Think Differently?"

I feel my relationship with technology is a pretty strong one, however I would not say I am a ‘Digital Native’. I know my way around my computer and IPhone but there are still some things I struggle with like making Excel pages or using Microsoft publisher, so in some ways I am also a ‘Digital Immigrant’.  Like many others without technology I would be lost. In today’s world you can look something up in seconds, can never get lost because we all have GPS’s and we can listen to our favorite songs all by using our phones. Also when it comes to research for writing papers we do not have to leave the comforts of our own homes to go the library, we simply just have to type our topic into Google and the information we need pops up. We are very lucky to have all this technology at our fingertips unlike the generations before us. Even with all this technology I sometimes prefer the ‘Digital Immigrants’ way of doing things. Like written in the Prensky article, digital immigrants print out articles that are written on a word document to edit instead of editing it in the document. I also like doing this when I have to edit a paper or when reading an article for class. I learn better when I have a hard copy in hand rather than reading it on the computer.  

I believe technology can help me in many ways as a youth worker. I feel this way because it will help grab the attention of the youth I will be working with. I remember when I was in school and my teachers would play School House Rock when we were learning about certain lessons. After watching the different episodes I could always remember the songs which had the learning message behind it. Those types of videos made learning fun for me and my classmates. Clearly with today’s youth School House Rock would not cut it but learning video games, like Prensky wrote about would definitely grab their attention. Not only is it about grabbing the youth’s attention but it would also show them that you want to connect with them in the way they are accustomed to doing things as ‘Digital Natives’.

Blog Post #1: "In a World Where Youth Hold the Power"

After reading the article ‘A World Where Youth Hold the Power’ by Adeola Oredola with members of Youth in Action, it made me have a new outlook on how the youth in our country are being educated and understood. Some of the main ideas in the article are bringing out the “youth’s capacity to lead, their natural ability to innovate, and their desire for positive change.”  To put it simply, the Youth in Action organization gives the youth in this program the power to run and help make all the decision in the organization. By learning these skills they can apply it to their own life experiences.

The YIA model does not resonate with me because I was not lucky enough to experience being  part of a program that helps the growth of youth’s natural abilities. But after reading the article and the stories of the members of the YIA organization I could relate to the issues they faced in the school system. The Learning and Speaking Truth section in the article written by Bukky Olugemi was a section I could really relate to and understand. I remember being in high school and reading books that I could not relate too, similar to Bukky. If we reading books that we could actually relate to and had open discussions on how we felt about each book we read (using the plus/delta model) it would be a completely different experience. Also I believe that if those discussion were to happen we would all have a better meaning and understanding of the books we read.

I agree with all points that were made in this article. If we started giving youth more power in all different areas of their lives it will only help them as they got older. That was the common theme of all the stories in the article. All the members of YIA said that the skills they learned from being in this organization only helped in their futures. I hope that the YIA model one day will be in all schools across the country so that all youths can gain the type of confidence and skills the youth’s in YIA have. 

About Me!

Hello :)

My name is Raquel and am a Youth Development major! I am in my final year at RIC and I couldn't be more excited and nervous at the same time. I was an Education major before switching to YDEV and I couldn't be happier about my decision to switch.

In my free time I enjoy being with my family and friends and I love going to concerts and spending countless hours at the beach!