Volunteer in or join an organization or get involved in a group comprised of people who are significantly different than you

This past summer as part of my study abroad requirement for Goshen College, I attended a Study-Service Term in Nicaragua for 12 weeks. During the first six weeks, each of the 23 students in my group lived with a host family, attended language and culture classes, went on field trips around the country, and ate a lot of Nicaraguan food. This was a great introduction to the country and it definitely helped to bolster my Spanish skills for what was to come. During the second six weeks, all of the students then moved to a service location. For many of us, our service assignments had at least something to do with our majors back at Goshen College. But again we lived with host families, worked in pairs at our service placements, practiced our Spanish, and ate a lot of Nicaraguan food.

For my service assignment, I wanted to work with kids, but I didn't want to be confined to teaching English. One opportunity was to work at an orphanage for developmentally disabled children. There weren't too many details provided, but I decided to go for it. I'm so glad that I did. During my six weeks working at Hogar Belen, I had the opportunity both to work with some fascinating children doing physical and occupational therapy and got to know some of the fabulous staff who worked with them day in and day out.

One of the most important things that I learned there that is definitely applicable to the field of teaching is the need for patience. For example, on our first day there, we were told that the woman in charge of physical therapy would be back by 1:00 to introduce to us the kids and teach us about what we would be doing. It turns out that she arrived by 2:00. This was a daily occurrence of things being scheduled for one time and happening at another or completely throwing the schedule to the wind and finding something else to do. For my service partner Jonna and I, this was frustrating for our North American sentiments about time and schedule.

The other way that I learned about patience was through working with the children. They were absolutely unlike any other children who I had worked with before. Many of the children were lacking verbal, social and motor skills. In my previous experiences with children, many children do not do what they are told simply because they don't want to. These children didn't always do what they were told because they couldn't or they didn't understand. For example, several children struggled to eat with a spoon, but this was something that the staff really emphasized was important for their development. The children became frustrated with the spoon and would just give up and eat with their hands. In the moment, it was frustrating to say every minute or so, "no, use your spoon," but looking back and being able to recognize that that patience and understanding of where they are coming from is really important.

My ability to stay calm with children in sometimes very stressful situations (with the additional challenge of communicating in Spanish), I think helped the children learn how to deal with situations in a better manner. One child, Karla, comes to mind. Too often she would become quite agitated when we tried to go to physical therapy or eat calmly at the table. She just wanted to do what she wanted to do and didn't want to listen to anyone else. One day after nap time, she was a little bit calmer and I invited her to come sit on my lap. As is a habit of mine, I began whistling. Very quickly, she became quite calm and attentive. As my interactions with her continued, I learned that music was an important way to calm and focus her. I'm glad that I took the time to find ways to connect with her even though at first interaction, she was a very frustrating child to work with. My supervisor actually commented on how well we were working together, and of course, I really appreciated that feedback.

This experience in Nicaragua was important in terms of working with people who are different than me, not only because I was working with some children with very severe disabilities, but because of the tremendous patience and care that I saw modeled as I worked with the Nicaraguan care staff at the facility. Even though their job was frustrating and relentless, they still showed such joy as they worked with the children. As Jonna and I got to know them better, they shared that these children are their second families and that even though the pay isn't great, this job was still worth it. That attitude, particularly because of the financial hardships evident in this area of the country, was particularly touching to me. It also helped me to see that common bond, that no matter how frustrating a job might be, it is relationships that can hold us together.

Study Effective Teachers

One of the many opportunities that was laid out for me during my student teaching was the opportunity to study effective teachers. So during the last weeks of my student teaching this fall, I tried to observe at least one or two classes each day other than the ones with my cooperating teacher. I thought that it was particularly important to observe other math teachers, but I also observed other teachers in my block (Language Arts, Science, and ESL), to get a sense of how they deal with some the same students that I saw in my classroom. Both types of observations were definitely helpful for a variety of reasons.

One teacher who I particularly enjoyed watching was Mrs. Weatherholt in 7th Grade Science. She taught in such a conversational manner so that student participation felt absolutely natural. As part of their weekly reading time, they read an article about earthquakes and then wrote their own paragraph summaries. She was very quick to praise each student who volunteered to read theirs aloud. It was not false flattery; she found specific aspects about each student's writing that she was able to commend. She had such presence with her students that they seemed compelled to pay attention and participate, even some of the students who have caused behavior problems in my class and in others.

Another observation that was particularly helpful to me was Ms. Taylor's ISTEP enrichment class, which is targeted towards students who are having trouble passing the math portion of the ISTEP. I taught this same class for a few weeks and really struggled with it, in part because the curriculum felt very prescribed. It was nice to see Ms. Taylor including those same elements that I did in my class, but in what felt like a more engaging and helpful manner. For example, for our daily bellwork questions, we both used the same material, but rather than reviewing the answers simply on the overhead, she asked students to share their answers on whiteboards. Another step that she utilized to further student learning on bellwork was that for problems that students had a great deal of difficulty on, she gave them the first step and then asked them to continue working out the problem on their whiteboards. I thought that this showed a good balance between skipping over difficult problems and ceaselessly answering questions. They also followed the same format as my class for the "10 Questions;" however, she spent time reviewing the day's skill and gave them quite a few examples before they went through the actual "10 Questions." Though I felt like she was covering the material much more thoroughly than either I or my cooperating teacher had been able to do, I felt like her class period was paced appropriately and that she was not rushing through material. It was inspiring to see her using the same tools as I had to work with in the class, but her using them much more effectively.