It's The Final Countdown!

One week left!

I cannot believe that it's dead week already. The last few years have really flown by. It has recently dawned on me that in a year I will be graduating from college, getting married, and starting a full time job. I get excited and a little scared at the same time when I think about the very near future.

I am super excited to start mentoring next semester. I remember my mentors telling me to enjoy my time at Iowa State because it goes by fast. At the time I was thinking that four years was a long time, and I doubted that it would go by that fast especially concidering all of the assignments I had already. I imagine I will tell my students this fall the same thing I was told and hopefully they will believe me.

It has been a pleasure to work with all of my fellow mentors and I look forward to working with them in the future!

Last Wednesday

I thought going through the mentoring confidence inventory was very helpful last week. I think I remember doing something similar at the beginning of the course and I can tell I am more confident in my ability to be an effective mentor.

I was glad to hear that Jenna is still able to be in the group next fall. The group would defiantly not be the same if she weren't there.

Diversity Event- Reece Waters

So I went to a diversity event back in February and I've been forgetting to write a blog post about it. So I hope this isn't too late.

I went to see stand up comedian Reece Waters in the M-Shop. I thought that overall Reece was funny. At first I was a little uncomfortable he was making jokes about his race because I'm wasn't sure if I should laugh or not. Obviously the point of the joke is to get people to laugh but It it seems awkward because the jokes are kind of inside jokes. But I've realized that comedy is just another way to spread awareness of differences and the challenges that others face because they are "different."

This event would be significant to the students that I will be teaching next fall because I am trying to expose myself to diversity which is something that incoming students should also do. I come from a small agricultural community, there really isn't much diversity there. For the most part everyone looks the same and has the same beliefs. I imagine that many of our students this fall will be coming from similar backgrounds. It is important to embrace diversity because who knows where you will end up after college. It's possible that you may get a job in a different part of the country, or even outside of the United States.

Campus Resources

So before last night I thought that I was pretty knowledgeable about the resources on campus. Turns out, I didn't know as much as I thought I did. I was completely unaware that there is a shelter for physical abuse that has a secretive location. A lot of the resources on the list that we were given I knew existed, but I have never used them nor do I know where they are. It is good that we went over them in class as a refresher. Maybe in the future I will try to take advantage of a few of the resouces just to see how they work.

I am an adult! When did this happen?

So this last week I wasn't able to come to class because I was down in Wichita, Kansas interviewing for an internship. While in the St. Louis airport waiting for my connecting flight I decided to stop at the Chilies right across from my gate to catch lunch. I'm not a huge fan of eating in restaurants by myself, but I really didn't have a choice. While waiting to be seated the guy at the bar waved me over to sit at the bar. Right away I knew he didn't think I was over 16 years old, which if you have never experienced someone thinking you are still in high school it's awkward... He started calling me "honey"....a lot. When I told him where I was going and what I was doing there I saw the surprise on his face when I told him I was interviewing with Cargill. And then he asked me how old I was....

While this is happening I'm thinking to myself that I don't think I look that young! This time next year I will be interviewing for a full-time job, getting married, and buying a house. I am an adult. When did this happen?

I guess what I learned from this experience is to at all times treat my students next year as adults. I was a little upset and uncomfortable when I was at Chilies and the bartender made me feel 5 years younger than I am.

Joke of the Week:
What is a zebra?

25 sizes larger than an "A" bra

Time Management

So with everything that is going on I forgot to blog last night. These past few weeks I have relied heavily on my planner and somehow I neglected to write down that I had to blog. It seems like every year around this time I feel like a chicken with its head cut off trying to scramble to get everything done. This year especially it seems like all of a sudden I have so much to do. I have projects due, a big interview this week, and in a few weeks is the horse show that I've been helping plan. Where did all of the time go?!? So far I've been able to manage my time well, but I am a little worried about these next few weeks. This time of year constantly reminds me how important time management is! It is great that we spend time with the first year students discussing time management. Coming into college I thought my time management skills were good, but I quickly found out that was not the case.

On another note, I thought the retreat last Saturday was was great! I had fun spending time with everyone.

What if...?

I thought that it was a very good use of class time this week when we discussed possible compromising situations. I really haven't put much thought into any of the situations previous to class, except for the drinking one because we've discussed that before. I think that it was good that we all came to a consensus on how we all are going to handle ourselves in these situations so we can be consistant.

The situation that made me think the most was what if one of your students is flirting with you. I personally am really bad at realizing when someone is flirting with me. Most of the time I just think that they are being friendly. It usually takes someone else to tell me that I was being flirted with, and even then I don't always believe them.

Joke of the Week:
Why don't aliens eat clowns?

Because they taste funny.

Facilitating Learning

I thought that the chapter on facilitating learning was very interesting. Usually when there is discussions on how people learn in classes the only types of learning that are mentioned ate the bodily/kinesthetic, verbal/linguistic, and visual. I haven't taken a pshycology class while at Iowa State so I wasn't even aware of the other types of learning that the book describes. As a peer mentor I will adjust to meet the needs of all of the learning styles of my students by incorporating different teaching tools in lessons. I will try to use visual elements, physical activity, and perhaps music during lessons. My German teacher in high school used to play classical music while we took exams to help us concentrate. She would also use cheezy german children's songs to help us learn vocabulary. Out of everything that I remember from her german class I remember most the songs we sang.

Joke of the Week:
What did the bartender say to the jumper cables when they walked into the bar?

OK you two - don't start anything.

Effective Communication

So after this week's class I started thinking about what I could do to improve my communication skills. I've realized that whenever I have problems with communication it is usually because there is no follow-up. If I've asked someone to do something in a committee I assume it was done and done on time, which is not always the case. If I had taken the time to touch back with that person or group to make sure everything has been done it would really save me some headaches and time. Next year some sort of follow-up that I could use in the classroom could be something as simple as having a quick 'go around' where everyone says how they have used/will use what they learned from the last class period. This way I can gauge if the learning outcomes for last week were met or not.

Joke of the Week:
Two peanuts walk into a bar.

One was a salted.

Diversity

After reading the articles that Heath and Allie gave us this past week I have come to realize how little diversity is in my life. Like most all of the peer mentors I come from a very small town. For the most part everyone was christian, and everyone was white. Since coming to college I have been exposed to more diversity, but all of the people that I associate with on a daily basis are very similar to me. I suppose this is mostly because I am in the college of ag and an animal science major. It is pretty rare for someone of a different race or ethnicity to be in one of my classes. Some of the reason why there is a lack of diversity in my life would probably have to do with the fact that meeting and talking to people who are very different from me puts me outside of my comfort zone. I am usually afraid that I will say something to offend someone. But I have made it a goal to go outside of my comfort zone more often. I usually learn the most when I'm doing something that I wouldn't typically do.

Joke of the day:
What do you call a dog with no legs?

It doesn't matter what you call him he isn't going to come.

Awareness Assessment

After taking the awareness assessment that Lisa and Jenna gave us this week in class I was a little surprised with the results. I scored the lowest in the emotional awareness which is a category I thought I would score higher in. I don't ever really get stressed, even when I have a lot on my plate. The way I see it is the more you worry about all of the things you have to do or about the things that are going wrong in your life the less you do about it. I tend to take things as they come and deal with them accordingly.

What significantly dropped my score in emotional awareness is that I am not comfortable taking risks. I took a class in entrepreneurship and all I really learned was that I will most likely work for "the man." I hope to become better at being able to take risks as one of my future goals is to own and manage my own organic/all natural pork operation.

Amber's Joke of the Day:

How do you get a Kleenex to dance?
~Put a little boogie in it!

Chapter 4- Establishing and Maintaining Relationships

While I was glancing through chapter 4 before class the "why are we here" section caught my attention. In this section five ground rules were listed honesty, commitment, boundaries, confidentiality, and expectations. The ground rule that stuck out in my mind was boundaries, because it got me thinking about the conversation we had in class the other week about what to do if you see a mentee at a party. Although the book doesn't address this situation specifically my guess would be that the authors of our book would want mentors to leave the party. I personally have mixed feelings on this issue. Ultimately if I were in this situation, although I will be of legal age, I would leave the party. However, I would first approach my mentee and make sure that they are not there alone, have a designated driver, and that they are being responsible.

ISLE Reflection

I went to the Effective Marketing Strategies session during ISLE. I got to the room before the person holding the session so as I was sitting in my gray plastic chair I was imagining what this person would look like. I assumed she would be a marketing instructor from the College of Business, she would be wearing a suit, and just in general appear "business-like." I also was expecting her presentation to perhaps be a little dry. I realize it was extremely stereotypical for me to think this way, but what can I say. I was surprised when in walked a shorter woman with thick soled boots, a black and white stripped flowy looking skirt, black shirt, darker eye makeup, and tattoos up and down her arms. My first thought when she walked in was, "She looks interesting, I bet what she has to say will be interesting too." As a result I paid more attention to what she had to say and have since remembered what she discussed.

I was thinking about this the other day, and it occurred to me that out of all of the classes I've taken the ones with the instructors that I found interesting are the classes that I remember and retained more information from. I plan on thinking more about what makes me interesting. I hope that if my section finds me interesting they will be more interested in what I have to say.