Woo-Hoo!
Thursday, April 24, 2008: Thursday was the last day for my grief and loss group. I co-facilitated with another intern and we wrapped up the group and had the members do evaluations. Their feedback on how the group went was important to me since it was the first group I have co-facilitated outside of role playing within the classroom. The school social worker who helped us get the group going in the school was grateful for our time and that we were so organized. (I like being organized, it gives less room for confusion:) The overall concensus of the group members was that they enjoyed being able to express themselves in the group.
Course Objective #5: (Last one!)
I interviewed an ex-offender in order to better understand their resources and how it has been for them to find what they need within the community. This particular client is a former veteran, so they can access medical care with the Veteran's Hospital in Indianapolis. The client is living in transitional housing for recovering alcoholics and clients with substance absue problems. Alcohol was the root of the offenses that got the client into trouble in the first place so they are trying to stay "sober, sane, and responsible" in order to keep their life on track. The client has many resources through this housing because they offer different meetings, such as Alcoholics Anonymous. This is helpful for the client because they are surrounded by people who understand what they are going through every step of the way. The client has also moved into a point within the housing where they can be a mentor for those coming into the house that need a little help getting started in the program. The client works a full-time job and has an outstanding work history. The client is very excited about this program and getting their life on the right track.
April 28, 2008: YAY! Today was my last day at my practicum. It seems as if this semester has just flown by. We all deserve a pat on the back for making it through this semester. I worked with my field instructor to make sure everything was in order for the final evaluation and portfolio (which I turned in this afternoon around five'o'clock). I am a little sad because just when we get comfortable somewhere, we have to change it up and find somewhere new, but I am looking forward to a break from schol this summer. YAY!!!
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Week #15
Almost there! Monday, I worked on finalizing and organizing some of my different things. I looked again at the learning plan to make sure that I had everything done and in order. In the afternoon, I had the grief and loss group. We had a little too much fun. I find that the students are becoming harder to keep on task, but we got everything on the agenda completed that we needed to. Tuesday, I worked on finalizing some more things as far as my portfolio goes. I am just trying to get a little ahead so that Monday is not as hectic.
Integration question: (Micro) The group that I co-facilitate will be ending this Thursday. I feel that the way that we have prepared the students for the ending is by giving them tools that they can use effectively on their own to deal with their own grief and loss. We have done a variety of exercises and discussed different ways to handle the different emotions (sadness, anger, etc.) that come with losing someone close to them. We have also provided other resources for them. Other group settings and activities that they can become involved in outside of school that might be even more helpful to them.
Integration question: (Micro) The group that I co-facilitate will be ending this Thursday. I feel that the way that we have prepared the students for the ending is by giving them tools that they can use effectively on their own to deal with their own grief and loss. We have done a variety of exercises and discussed different ways to handle the different emotions (sadness, anger, etc.) that come with losing someone close to them. We have also provided other resources for them. Other group settings and activities that they can become involved in outside of school that might be even more helpful to them.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Week # 14
Monday: I worked in the office most of the day. I had some individual meeting time with my field instructor to make sure that I was on the right track and would have everything on my learning plan complete by the end of the semester. I also had another session with my grief and loss group. Since it was the last period of the day, I think they were ready to go. They were a little rowdy, but they are talking more to each other. One of the students made a comment to her counselor that they liked the group and did not know that there were other students who had lost someone close to them. That made me feel pretty good because even if the students do not always listen and pick up on what I want them to pick up on, they at least know now that they are not alone.
Tuesday: This was a pretty busy day. I started by interviewing a Medical social worker at the corporate building for Marion County Health and Hospital Corporations (for my course objective #16). I began by asking her the different types of jobs that she has done as a social worker and which ones she liked and disliked. She was very open which I appreciated. I feel that sometimes, because someone knows that we are going into the field, they try to sugarcoat it and avoid talking about some of their bad experiences. Bad experiences come with any job and social work is a tough field; we all know that coming in. Anyhow, she was very open about her answers. I interviewed her about how her experiences have made her more aware of herself and her own beliefs. We discussed the grieving process. She spoke about a former client that she had in another position and how she lost her husband while she was their family's social worker. She talked about thinking how strong this woman was and how hard it must have been for her. While this was going on in her workplace, the social worker said that someone close to her was also becoming very ill and eventually passed around the same time of the client's husband. She said that, in a way, it gave her hope to move on because her client had done so. I thought that was a very interesting story about how our clients affect us sometimes just as much as we affect them.
After that interview, I headed over to meet with an HIV Outreach worker for another interview (Objective #6). This worker is also HIV positive and goes into the community and speak out about HIV education and advocacy. It was pretty inspiring especially considering the medical affects that someone has with HIV. This person is a very active member of the community and feels passionately about sharing their story with others. The main topic of the interview was support systems and how the client's life has changed since they have been diagnosed. They had some very interesting things to say about their own journey and coming to terms with the virus and their own addictions.
After that, I went to work with Covering Kids and Families and shadowed an employee at the South District health office. We did not have too many clients, but the afternoon went by quickly. I will be returning to work with them next week.
Integrative question for the week: (HBSE) Although I do not have client contact everyday, I do have to evaluate from some of the different things that I have done. For example, another intern and I did a presentation at a high school about abstinence. I measured the success of our presentation based on the pre and post test scores of the students. How much did they really learn from our presentation? It was pretty interesting to see how they reacted to some of the facts I presented and that was another way I gauged my performance. If I saw eyes when I looked around the room, I knew I was doing something right because they were at least paying attention. I tried to keep them engaged in discussion and really push a couple of points that I thought were necessary that they know when they left the room. I could have always had them fill out an evaluation, but I think that a lot of them would have ended up on the floor not being filled out. I think at the end of my grief and loss group I will have them fill out an evaluation so that I can know what to work on.
Tuesday: This was a pretty busy day. I started by interviewing a Medical social worker at the corporate building for Marion County Health and Hospital Corporations (for my course objective #16). I began by asking her the different types of jobs that she has done as a social worker and which ones she liked and disliked. She was very open which I appreciated. I feel that sometimes, because someone knows that we are going into the field, they try to sugarcoat it and avoid talking about some of their bad experiences. Bad experiences come with any job and social work is a tough field; we all know that coming in. Anyhow, she was very open about her answers. I interviewed her about how her experiences have made her more aware of herself and her own beliefs. We discussed the grieving process. She spoke about a former client that she had in another position and how she lost her husband while she was their family's social worker. She talked about thinking how strong this woman was and how hard it must have been for her. While this was going on in her workplace, the social worker said that someone close to her was also becoming very ill and eventually passed around the same time of the client's husband. She said that, in a way, it gave her hope to move on because her client had done so. I thought that was a very interesting story about how our clients affect us sometimes just as much as we affect them.
After that interview, I headed over to meet with an HIV Outreach worker for another interview (Objective #6). This worker is also HIV positive and goes into the community and speak out about HIV education and advocacy. It was pretty inspiring especially considering the medical affects that someone has with HIV. This person is a very active member of the community and feels passionately about sharing their story with others. The main topic of the interview was support systems and how the client's life has changed since they have been diagnosed. They had some very interesting things to say about their own journey and coming to terms with the virus and their own addictions.
After that, I went to work with Covering Kids and Families and shadowed an employee at the South District health office. We did not have too many clients, but the afternoon went by quickly. I will be returning to work with them next week.
Integrative question for the week: (HBSE) Although I do not have client contact everyday, I do have to evaluate from some of the different things that I have done. For example, another intern and I did a presentation at a high school about abstinence. I measured the success of our presentation based on the pre and post test scores of the students. How much did they really learn from our presentation? It was pretty interesting to see how they reacted to some of the facts I presented and that was another way I gauged my performance. If I saw eyes when I looked around the room, I knew I was doing something right because they were at least paying attention. I tried to keep them engaged in discussion and really push a couple of points that I thought were necessary that they know when they left the room. I could have always had them fill out an evaluation, but I think that a lot of them would have ended up on the floor not being filled out. I think at the end of my grief and loss group I will have them fill out an evaluation so that I can know what to work on.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Week #13
Monday: Whew! What a day! I started off at Manual High School in the morning. Another intern and I did another presentation about Sexually Transmitted Infections and Teengage Pregnancy. (I got to do the fun part with STI's.) All in all, the presentation went well. Most of the students in the class were attentive and I felt like most of them picked up at least one new thing from the presentation that they didn't know before.
After that, I headed to a middle school on the eastside to co-facilitate a grief and loss group. This was their first day back from spring break and the school has undergone some construction so things were a little out of order when we arrived. We spent about ten minutes rounding the students up for the group, but then we got started. We started with an icebreaker game and then we laid out the rules and regulations of the group. We also asked the group members to sign confidentiality agreements so that we could ensure that they understood how important it was to keep everything said in the group confidential. We explained what activities we would be doing throughout the group and gave them the schedule for the next five sessions and their journals. We are going to use memory journals to let the students in the group express themselves and get the ball rolling on different discussions. I felt like the first session went pretty well and we figured out some things that we should do differently for next time.
Tuesday: I went to a workshop in the morning for Technology and Advocacy at the Julian Center. I am pretty sure that the title was "Keeping up with the Techies". I thought it was a very interesting presentation about technology and the different ways it can be used to help and hurt clients, particularly those victims of domestic violence. I can definitely say that I learned several things from this workshop. The second part was dedicated to confidentiality from a legal standpoint with abusers and victims from which I also learned many new things. The workshop ran way over its time so I was not able to make my second appointment of the day with the Covering Kids and Families Program. Last week, I got to work in the the building with some of the ladies and gentlemen who happened to be in the center on Tuesday afternoon. They showed me how they do some of the intake information and enter it into the database, but we only had a few walk-ins.
Course Objective # 4: While I was at Covering Kids, I did get a chance to speak with a client from Africa who had come in to fill out some paperwork. The client was working, but had recently lost their job. The client was also a student at a nearby college which I thought was interesting. The client said that they had to go slowly in school because when they first came to this country, their English was not very good. I thought it was pretty awesome that the client was working so hard to further their education and overcome the language barriers that they encountered.
I blogged about an ethical dilemma for last week's post, but here is another concern that I have. I have been doing some work in different IPS High Schools and have found out why IPS schools have such a high drop out rate. I have a few different theories, but most of them involve the fact that the students are treated as if they are incompetent. I was in a school recently talking to the students in a class for quite awhile. At first, they were loud and rowdy, but after about half the class was over, most of them were asleep. I told the students not to fall asleep on me. I heard the teacher make the comment that it might be better for them to be asleep than to be loud again. I don't know about that. My purpose there was to teach them. I can't teach people who are asleep. How do the teachers do it everyday? I know that teaching in IPS schools is a tough job, but I would like to think that not everyone has lost hope for their students. My high school had high expectations of their students and I cannot imagine going to class and it be acceptable for students to sleep during class. Why are our expectations so low of these students? Perhaps if we demand more, we just might get it more often. Kids are kids. They are going to push buttons to see what they can get away with, but why are they allowed to get away with so much? Please don't misunderstand, I am not blaming our teachers for the low graduation rate in our IPS schools. This is a problem that cannot be blamed on any one particular source. Parents have a role in their child's learning too. The whole community has a role in their school's performance. I just feel that if we expected more, we might get more from our students.
After that, I headed to a middle school on the eastside to co-facilitate a grief and loss group. This was their first day back from spring break and the school has undergone some construction so things were a little out of order when we arrived. We spent about ten minutes rounding the students up for the group, but then we got started. We started with an icebreaker game and then we laid out the rules and regulations of the group. We also asked the group members to sign confidentiality agreements so that we could ensure that they understood how important it was to keep everything said in the group confidential. We explained what activities we would be doing throughout the group and gave them the schedule for the next five sessions and their journals. We are going to use memory journals to let the students in the group express themselves and get the ball rolling on different discussions. I felt like the first session went pretty well and we figured out some things that we should do differently for next time.
Tuesday: I went to a workshop in the morning for Technology and Advocacy at the Julian Center. I am pretty sure that the title was "Keeping up with the Techies". I thought it was a very interesting presentation about technology and the different ways it can be used to help and hurt clients, particularly those victims of domestic violence. I can definitely say that I learned several things from this workshop. The second part was dedicated to confidentiality from a legal standpoint with abusers and victims from which I also learned many new things. The workshop ran way over its time so I was not able to make my second appointment of the day with the Covering Kids and Families Program. Last week, I got to work in the the building with some of the ladies and gentlemen who happened to be in the center on Tuesday afternoon. They showed me how they do some of the intake information and enter it into the database, but we only had a few walk-ins.
Course Objective # 4: While I was at Covering Kids, I did get a chance to speak with a client from Africa who had come in to fill out some paperwork. The client was working, but had recently lost their job. The client was also a student at a nearby college which I thought was interesting. The client said that they had to go slowly in school because when they first came to this country, their English was not very good. I thought it was pretty awesome that the client was working so hard to further their education and overcome the language barriers that they encountered.
I blogged about an ethical dilemma for last week's post, but here is another concern that I have. I have been doing some work in different IPS High Schools and have found out why IPS schools have such a high drop out rate. I have a few different theories, but most of them involve the fact that the students are treated as if they are incompetent. I was in a school recently talking to the students in a class for quite awhile. At first, they were loud and rowdy, but after about half the class was over, most of them were asleep. I told the students not to fall asleep on me. I heard the teacher make the comment that it might be better for them to be asleep than to be loud again. I don't know about that. My purpose there was to teach them. I can't teach people who are asleep. How do the teachers do it everyday? I know that teaching in IPS schools is a tough job, but I would like to think that not everyone has lost hope for their students. My high school had high expectations of their students and I cannot imagine going to class and it be acceptable for students to sleep during class. Why are our expectations so low of these students? Perhaps if we demand more, we just might get it more often. Kids are kids. They are going to push buttons to see what they can get away with, but why are they allowed to get away with so much? Please don't misunderstand, I am not blaming our teachers for the low graduation rate in our IPS schools. This is a problem that cannot be blamed on any one particular source. Parents have a role in their child's learning too. The whole community has a role in their school's performance. I just feel that if we expected more, we might get more from our students.
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Week #12
Monday: Worked with supervisor finalizing some interview questions for my learning plan. Attempted to contact a social worker upstairs in the ACTION Health Center. Worked on various projects from the learning plan.
Ethical dilemma: A teacher within an elementary school was observed knocking a girl to the ground. The teacher was using the girl in an example of how not to act toward other students (pushing, etc.), but apparently, the teacher did not know their own strength. This teacher was also observed making students stand for more than an hour of classtime as a punishment. Two of these students were from other classes and other teachers. This teacher humiliates the students by making them stand in front of the class for elongated periods of time and seems to have a reputation among other teachers as a "punisher" which would be how these students end up in a different class for punishment. Solution: The person who observed this went to the school social worker. She seemed concerned, but referred that person to the school principal to tell what they had seen. The principal then sent out a memo to the teachers about the proper way to administer punishment to the students. This does not seem to be an effective way to deal with the situation. The teacher should have been suspended the first time they were observed touching the student. Then, warnings and memos should have been issued to other teachers.
Tuesday: I finished up some things in the office for my learning plan and worked on a variety of different tasks. Nothing too spectacular happened.
Ethical dilemma: A teacher within an elementary school was observed knocking a girl to the ground. The teacher was using the girl in an example of how not to act toward other students (pushing, etc.), but apparently, the teacher did not know their own strength. This teacher was also observed making students stand for more than an hour of classtime as a punishment. Two of these students were from other classes and other teachers. This teacher humiliates the students by making them stand in front of the class for elongated periods of time and seems to have a reputation among other teachers as a "punisher" which would be how these students end up in a different class for punishment. Solution: The person who observed this went to the school social worker. She seemed concerned, but referred that person to the school principal to tell what they had seen. The principal then sent out a memo to the teachers about the proper way to administer punishment to the students. This does not seem to be an effective way to deal with the situation. The teacher should have been suspended the first time they were observed touching the student. Then, warnings and memos should have been issued to other teachers.
Tuesday: I finished up some things in the office for my learning plan and worked on a variety of different tasks. Nothing too spectacular happened.
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