week 12
1050 words by gonayiga
As time goes on, I am becoming more and more enthusiastic about working on my project because of the progress being made. I’ve gotten a chance to work with new students and be able to give my advice and personal experience on how to do well in school and be successful out of school. There was one student in particular that I worked with in physics. He had a hard time solving problems because he lacked the confidence in his math skills. He would sometimes forget steps or make small mistakes that would affect the answer of the problem. To help him regain confidence in his self and to help him remember all the steps to solving the physics problems I began to work more with him on a one on one level. I would help him with examples for him to follow and I was able to write down a list of directions for him to follow also. He then started to get familiar with the material and showed signs of progress as he put more time and effort into learning the material. I also worked with another middle school student that attended St. Augustine High School. His problem was that he was not the best at taking notes and it had a profound affect on his quizzes and test scores. I asked him the routine of how the teacher would give the notes for the class to take and I noticed that he had a hard time reading the notes because they were not typed but handwritten on overhead sheets. I understood where he was coming from because I had a hard time reading some of the teacher’s notes myself. He then went on to say that the teacher did in fact make notes for them to get on the Internet. The thing was the necessary things he had to do to get the notes was not something that he wanted to take the time and do. Because of his schedule that included extracurricular activities, he would have to get to school early and print the notes off of the computer in the library. I explained to him that life is full of problems like these and you are always going to have to do things that you do not want to do. I also explained to him that he is the only one to blame if he fails the course because he did not feel like going the extra mile to get the necessary notes given in class. He seemed to take my advice and he slowly but surely got into the routine of getting good notes. I not only had the opportunity to talk with the students but the teachers also. After working with the students I now have a new found respect for the stress that students put on teachers. I was amazed by how they could come to work everyday and deal with all the stress of the job they had to deal with. This was especially true with the junior high school students since they lacked the most self discipline. When we as the volunteers were not tutoring, we would engage in personal discussions with the students we were mentoring. The conversations included what they wanted to be when they grew up, their college plans, their backgrounds, and whatever else was on their minds. The frequent answer we got for where they saw themselves in 10 years, was either a professional athelete or a rapper. After hearing these answers, it was apparent that they didn’t know what they wanted to do after high school. We would discuss with them different career outlets, job outlooks that we knew about, and college. Conversations like these helped us as the the tutors and mentors become more aquainted with the students and we were able to have a good time while we enjoyed each other’s company.
The definition of counter culture in sociology is used to describe a cultural group whose values and norms do not coincide with the traditional norms and values of the mainstream. Jesus can be seen as counter cultural because he did not act in the same manner of the culture he was in. The Jewish perception of the Messiah was that he would confirm what the Old Testament said. Jesus was not what was expected and he emphasized loving one another rather than enforcing the law. Instead of punishing sinners, Jesus would help them and talk to them so they could stop being sinners. Jesus says that sinners are the people who need him the most. At that time it was counter cultural to rehabilitate offenders, or sinners. I think the purpose of my project is somewhat counter cultural because of the conversations that we have that don’t pertain to school. A lot of the time the students that we mentor have a distorted view on the real world depending on their age group. The younger students seem to all want to go into the same thing or they do not have any idea of what they really want to do instead of saying what people want to hear. We generally give them a heads up on what to expect such as applying for colleges, preparing for SATs and the ACTs, and other things that emphasize that they need to go to college. Another thing that we do is basically give them the same talk about the likelyhood of them making it into professional sports that we have heard from older generations. They seem to be more responsive to us instead of someone like one of their teachers because we are able to relate to them so much more. The reasons why I would not say that my project is counter cultural is because it would be a shame that if the goals of my project and the goals of Men on the Move is counter cultural against the mainstream. For example, that it’s not cool to want to do something other than rap or play sports. I feel that it should be part of mainstream culture for people to feel the urge to better themselves academically and spiritually instead of just physically.
