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Return
to Table of Contents for More Strategies INTRODUCTION: Many problems in school
or the workplace are the result of self-defeating attitudes held by students or
workers. Self-defeating attitudes lead to negative choices, and negative
choices quickly get people into academic or employment difficulties. To help
students become aware of self-defeating attitudes and what they can do to
improve them, I used this activity in a non-credit Success Workshop. These
workshops, offered weekly by our college, are open to the public and are
attended by college students, high school students, and community members.
I chose to focus on self-defeating attitudes in the workplace so that
attending community members would feel included. With its focus on workplace attitudes, this
strategy could be used in any career or work readiness course. However, by
simply revising the scenarios to a college setting, it would be ideal for any
college orientation or college success class to help students identify
self-defeating attitudes that may get them off course academically. It could
also be used in any course where the instructor wants students to apply course
content to real-life problems: e.g., engineering, sociology, or history,
psychology. Instructors using the “On Course” text can use this activity to
reinforce concepts found in Chapter 6 (Gaining Self-Awareness) or Chapter 8
(Developing Emotional Intelligence). Time needed: approximately one hour. PURPOSE: To offer students an
opportunity to…
SUPPLIES/SETUP: *HANDOUT:
“What’s Going On?” from the I-CANS (Integrated Curriculum for Achieving
Necessary Skills) website: http://www.literacynet.org/icans/chapter06/whats.html.
This handout provides six brief scenarios for discussion. I deleted the
directions and substituted discussion questions below. *Discussion Questions #1 (displayed on an overhead transparency or blackboard) A. What attitudes and behaviors of other people get on your nerves? B. Think of someone you know who has/had problems at school or work. What attitudes or behaviors have led to the problem? *Discussion Questions #2 (displayed on an overhead transparency or blackboard) A. What’s going on? Why does each person act as they do? B. What is likely
to happen if each person maintains his/her present attitude and behavior? C. What advice
would you give this person about his/her attitude and behavior?
*Pens or pencils and
paper DIRECTIONS: 1. Have students make two lines facing each
other in pairs. If there is an uneven number of students, you can
participate in the activity yourself. 2. Show Discussion Questions #1, and tell
students, “Today we are going to explore the connections between attitudes,
behaviors and outcomes. To begin thinking about this topic, you are going to
talk with the person you are facing about the discussion questions on the board
(or overhead). Question 1 is ‘What attitudes and behaviors of other
people get on your nerves?’ You’ll have a couple of minutes to talk, and
when I call time, change partners by this line moving one person to the right
while the other line stays in the same place. The person without a partner
in the moving line will go to the other end of that line to find a new partner.
After we change partners, discuss Question 2 with your second partner.
When I call time, switch partners again and discuss Question 1. And then
Question 2 and so on. Any questions?” 3. “Okay, let’s begin.” After
two minutes of talking, have students change partners by one line moving while
the other line stands in the same place. Repeat this process until each person
has discussed each question at least twice. 4. Ask students to sit in groups of 5. Give students the following directions:
“In your groups, read the six scenarios out loud. I have posted three
additional questions on the board [or overhead]. Please discuss each
question for each scenario and have one person record the group’s answers.
[20-30 minutes] 6. In a large-group discussion, ask each
group’s spokesperson to present their responses to the scenarios. Start with a
different group of students for each situation. Reinforce and highlight
comments that students make about 1) the causal relationship between
attitudes/behaviors and outcomes and 2) our ability to change outcomes by
choosing different attitudes and behaviors. [15 minutes] EXPERIENCES: I love presenting in our College Success
Workshop series because of the variety of folks who attend. During the
discussion of the initial two questions, I participated in the partner line
because there was an uneven number of students in the class. The students
I talked to identified some issues in their workplace including co-workers who
constantly complain about their jobs or those who do sloppy work. The
participants seemed to enjoy the opportunity to vent their pet peeves about
attitudes and behaviors of fellow students and co-workers, and some of the
students wanted to keep talking after I called time. I was pleased that they had
a lot to discuss since they would be able to apply their experiences to the
upcoming scenarios. Using the second set of discussion
questions, students compiled their answers for each scenario. A couple of
groups finished early, and when I called time at 25 minutes, two of five groups
had not completed discussing all scenarios. However, my priority was to
have time to discuss each scenario in the larger group. The students had many good ideas about how to improve the situations presented in the case studies. Since the scenarios do not go into great depth, they leave room for interpretation which was interesting at times. For example, in the first situation some folks assumed Melinda was not a team player while others perceived her as needing training about what tasks she should be doing when she finishes her work early. This raised the issue of needing to take initiative on the job. There was disagreement about scenario number
three and some of the younger students did not understand why Jose’s boss
would be upset with him. This led to a discussion of implicit versus
explicit job requirements and expectations of minimum performance. Some
students wanted to blame employee mistakes on lack of training (how does Jose
know he should pick up litter and trash?). The peer to peer
teaching/learning came into play when other workshop participants pointed out
that employers are looking for employees that take the initiative to do what
needs to be done without being told. My favorite moment of this workshop was when a high school student said that the character Darlene in scenario number two needed to “stop being a hater and chill out.” He got a laugh and elaborated on specific ways Darlene could interpret Laneeka’s comments to improve her [Darlene’s] reaction to the situation. His suggestions included ways that she could take constructive criticism and learn something from the situation instead of being defensive. This student was applying important concepts of Emotional Intelligence. OUTCOMES: The purpose of this activity is to have
students identify negative attitudes and behaviors and present ways to change
them. I believe these goals were achieved. The large group
discussion revealed that many of the workshop participants know both what
employers are looking for and how to be responsible, pleasant employees.
The group dynamic was particularly effective because we had some working women
in the workshop who supplied solutions that younger participants did not
identify due to lack of experience. Students identified self-defeating attitudes and behaviors in the workplace as illustrated in the scenarios. They also came up with many ideas for alternative attitudes and behaviors that the characters could adopt to improve the situation. Students collectively identified the following as desirable attitudes and behaviors that employers seek: taking initiative on the job, being a team player, having a strong work ethic, being honest, being reliable, and being able to learn new tasks. It’s not much of a stretch to say that college instructors are seeking these same qualities. LESSONS LEARNED: This activity takes about an hour to complete thoroughly. One alternative to shorten the time is to assign each group a different scenario. I did like having each group work on all scenarios because the discussion was very rich for each case; however, by the end of the discussions some of the answers were becoming repetitive. I asked students to come up with new and specific solutions in each case and not just accept that “getting fired” would be a likely outcome. A more realistic outcome could be missing out on opportunities for promotion or not being able to use the employer as a reference in the future. --Barb Brown, Academic Counselor, * * * * * The ON COURSE NEWSLETTER publishes innovative strategies for helping students become active, responsible learners. To subscribe to this bi-weekly (monthly in the summer) e-newsletter, click here and send the resulting e-mail. No need to type anything. Our computer will automatically add your return address to the list of subscribers. You're always in charge of your subscription, with a subscribe/unsubscribe link in every newsletter. Have a best practice to share? Click here and request our publication guidelines.
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