Day 1 Activities

After our group was properly inaugurated as Mr. Gonzales' 4th Hour U.S. History U.W.M. service learners, we conducted some activities for our students to participate in. The first activity called for the students to write information about themselves on a note card. This information included their name, their favorite things to do, favorite musicians / groups, as well as their favorite T.V. shows / movies.I feel this activity was beneficial at exposing commonalities between my group and the students. To no surprise, these topics of questions didn't fail to strike up conversations. It was hard to believe that so shortly after awkwardly exchanging names, the students and my group were sharing intricate details of their favorite Family Guy episodes, Jay-Z song, or their favorite games to play. After countless chuckles and debates over which song or movie was better, we prompted the students with the next set of questions. Unlike the previous questions, these questions were a lot more complex and personal. The next series of questions probed the students to consider how they identify complex social structures including race, ethnicity, stereotypes, and how the arrays of socially classifiable groups are perceived by the public. The answers to these questions were a lot harder to extract as we were attempting to avoid the invasion of personal barriers. Our students came up with some strong answers, and I do not believe anyone was offended nor did I feel that the students were very apprehensive about the topic. I feel that perhaps my group, three 19-21 year-old, white college students might not have received such openness and willingness to share their views if we were to ask the same questions of some of their parents, or other older community members.