Josh W. Reflection
1. In the Gender Bender group a lot of things went well for us. One thing that well was that everyone always seemed to be occupied with something to do whether it was watching/commenting on a skit, performing a skit, watching a commercial, or having a discussion. Another thing that went great for us was that everybody had something to say about the commercial and everyone understood what we were trying to teach them. The last thing that went well for us was that everybody enjoyed having a conversation about the topic with their peers. They didn’t feel shy except for one group of fifth graders.
2. I think that being a “teacher” for two hours is pretty cool. I felt like I was in command and everybody was always listening to me. If I asked someone to stop doing something they would stop. But it wasn’t exactly easy because you never want to have an awkward silence so I had to always be prepared to ask a new question or have a new comment that they could talk about. Also it was challenging because I always needed to be ready to answer questions and i didn’t want to tell them that i didn’t know the answer. I guess that it was a very good simulation of being a “teacher”, but there were some points where Sherezada or Frank had to step in and say something to the kids, which did help us in retrospect.
3. If i could do something to change our workshop i would have mixed up the groups a little better. When two kids were together that didn’t want to perform we had to perform for them and when two best friends were together they wouldn’t work, they would just pretend like they were shooting each other with made up weapons and pretending to drink a lot of beer. Another thing that i would do is have some more questions for the participants because you never want awkward silences, which happened a couple of times but only for 5 seconds.
4. I leave with an understanding of how to help for a certain cause. I got to go to an organization and raise money for them by myself and it makes me feel very accomplished. I now realize how non-profit organizations work and how I can get people to help or help myself. It has been a great experience.
5. My set-up groups were in the beginning a little out of control because too many people were in the music group. We had to split up into two different groups, one group having already been a band for six months. So after a while some people from my band went to the other band because they new the song they were playing and i got screwed along with Julian and Will. But in the end Lenny offered Will Julian, and I to do a new song with him and Julian and I accepted, but for some reason Will said that he didn’t want to come in and play with us. So i would say that it went well.
6. I definitely had a rough time getting to the teach-inn with my group. One of my group members did his fair share of work and the other one left all of his share of work for me to do. So in retrospect i had to do double the work that i should have. But i got it done and it was a very successful teach-inn. I think for next year you (the teachers) shouldn’t let the students be so free. You should really give three positions to each group and they decide which one each of them gets themselves. Because if one person doesn’t pull their weight no one feels like they should step in and pull it themselves, the person who didn’t pull it just gets screwed.
7. I think that the very end of the teach-inn where everybody talks about their organization should be a little more organized and planned earlier with a script because people were winging it and it didn’t look great.