Reflecting on experience breeds self-awareness
- Aoyumi Jung
- Jul 8, 2021
- 5 min read
July 08 2021
Besides my voluntary work at Covid 19 Vaccination center, Thammasat University Rangsit, I have spent the rest of time this summer supporting the self-development of young students. Over May and June, I have done a number of meetings, talks, sharing sessions with young students from my high school on English study, soft skills, club management, university orientation and emotional connection. Today, I had the pleasure to meet with an amazing cohort of GSSE freshmen on the topic of self-awareness in university life.
The session I did with the students was quite a success?! I was conveying what comes out of my heart. I don’t know how much potential I hold to become a facilitator and teacher. Regardless, I must step out of my comfort zone and give it a try more often. I was interacting with a more mature group of students than the group that I want to teach in the future. I was so impressed by their reflection on the activity I led “it was a deep activity to look at our hidden identity – the traits that we didn’t portray in our social media or tell our friends. You have to admit everybody has a different side and there is a certain side that they don’t want to express to others. Everyone faces struggles. Certain things they show publicly might not what they truly feel like.” I will do a plus-delta review on this experience and share some rock-star lessons I found from that in this blog.
Review on my performance
Plus:
- I went with the flow of my stories and those of the students.
- I didn’t make up the scene or my background. I was there with my focus, my intention to be connected, to learn from the students, and share something relevant to their expectations.
- I had the right idea to make the session become an interactive session where there are diverse activities to set context, presentation, questions and answers and activities for self-reflection. I took the lead to create the structure for the session and applied my technical skills from JUMP! To make the sessions lively. I am so glad that we planned appropriately with role and content division.
- I consider students’ needs and input them into the check-in and debrief parts.
- I ensured some details about logistics, a backup plan for silent moments, timekeeping, open chat in messenger group to be flexible, I took over the breakout room host to manage technical logistics, set the open timer, tried to encourage equal sharing of voice, not just talking from my side because I viewed myself as a facilitator and space holder. I respected students’ choice if they chose to be silent.
- I was flexible to do check-in with some students arriving late in the main room so they didn’t feel lost.
- Would love to do more energizers and activities of self-reflection in the future with the students.
Delta:
- I should encourage students to respond to their friends’ sharing so they can have the space to share with each other.
- I wish the debrief could happen in small breakout rooms too but for the other room didn’t go well with timing, I must follow it. Next time can manage time better.
- I was getting on my nerves at the starting point of the session because of the lacking communication with the coordinator. We didn’t need a tech person to just open the zoom and accept students freely without knowing our organizing plan. I could host the zoom and set up the essential features to make the session smooth, and especially not accept students until 9 am. I could not share music without screen share. Next time, this authority must be clearly communicated in advance to handle the zoom flexibly in the interest of time and roles. I should stay calm in such a situation not to disturb the readiness of the students who show up very on time.
What is my highlight?
I was telling my own stories nonstop for 20 minutes and I was not aware of how much I was telling. I was impressed by some big questions students asked like “will they classes be mainly lecture-based and will we still learn much”, “how to find internship”, “how to be more confident”, “how to survive university”, “Is it necessary to take a Master degree in Finance to apply for Boston Consultant Group?”. The student asking the last question is very open and straightforward about her extrovert identity and how she wants to be perfect with high performance. Half of the class was comfortable with the camera on and the atmosphere was comfortable. I am not sure whether what I said made sense or not. Sometimes my brain was out of control and my English went crazy. At least, I was my authentic self as sharing the advice from my hands-on experience that students can relate to and apply some ideas to their university.
What did I learn from today?
There are always students who are very excited about learning and who are not under readiness and clear expectation. I don’t expect much in certain programs that I do so I can understand them. Planning technical management helps a lot to ensure the flow to go fluently. It was necessary to have the review call with the organizing team after the session to check out our feelings and thoughts on the experience, especially to see what to improve. I learned this evaluation culture from JUMP and it has deepened my ability to handle repetitive problems. If we don’t point it out and specify what actions to take to address it, it won’t change for the better. Feedback must be specific and action-oriented. I learnt to listen and create a safe space for the students to be vulnerable. After the session, I asked for feedback about my own facilitation from my teammate as well. I learnt that I do have the potential to inspire young students. My facilitation has gained some progress compared to myself one year ago when I asked students to stand up even before giving instruction to the activity. Now, I consider other factors such as timing, holding space, mood check, learning reflection, building up conversations and respect the choice of students. I can’t wait to see how I would be in the next one year.
What will stick with me after today?
What sticks with me will be the inspiration to hold space for more young students to discover their self-awareness. The energy and curiosity of today’s students will stick with me. Also, it was great to receive some messages from students to me “I want to cry as hearing my words”. I hope we will soon have a normal life back to our green campus and immerse in real university life. I will continue my blogging project – a starry achievement in the first half of 2021. I am more determined to practice facilitation for JUMP! Foundation’s international school kids in this coming academic year. I am very grateful for my choice and passion for education. Keep up this momentum!
Commentaires