Despite maintaining that self-awareness is a considerable strength of mine, upon my reflections in my journal entry from week 3, I found some limitations within my approach to communicating with the culturally diverse. I have never considered myself as someone who is racist or who is inherently prone to stereotyping, on the contrary I feel that I generally display mindfulness and seek to gain understanding of things (in this case cultures) that I don’t understand. However, despite the possibility of this being seen as another strength, upon attempting to fill out a survey on ‘my views’ within the tutorial, I found myself limited with honest perceptions of popular minorities within Australia, including low income housing tenants and asylum seekers
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In week six we focussed specifically on working with groups, to which I believe is strength of mine. In that week’s tutorial our scenario was of a community group meeting in which several members of the community had come together to discuss what could be done about the issue of young people on the streets making excess amounts of noise. I took on the role of the community worker aiming to facilitate a productive conversation with two very aggressive and two passive community members. In my journal reflection that week I mention how I was ‘nervous about what I should suggest and what I should say’ because I had had no experience being the mediator in the studio (or in any professional context) prior to this activity. However once in the studio, I found it was natural for me to simply listen to what the people had to say, and simultaneously make sure that everyone’s opinions had been heard before moving onto initiating a discussion where everyone was able to share what they felt would be the ideal solution to the issue. One of the fundamental aspects of effective group functioning is the members feelings and experience of inclusion (O 'Hara & Weber 2005) and my journal entry provides the feedback I received from my tutor Angela after our studio session, …show more content…
Having the ability to recognise does not however correlate to an ability to affectively demonstrate skills, and in some aspects of communication including working with minorities and other populations that I have limited exposure to, as well as in public situations, I feel that there is room to further development my ability to effectively communicate. Expanding my knowledge and having awareness of these limitations however, is the first step in minimising them and as such I can strive to further utilise the resources available to me at university and at home in order to not only be more successful with my studies at university but to gain the confidence and high quality skillset needed to be successful in the field of social work in which I hope to
In week six we focussed specifically on working with groups, to which I believe is strength of mine. In that week’s tutorial our scenario was of a community group meeting in which several members of the community had come together to discuss what could be done about the issue of young people on the streets making excess amounts of noise. I took on the role of the community worker aiming to facilitate a productive conversation with two very aggressive and two passive community members. In my journal reflection that week I mention how I was ‘nervous about what I should suggest and what I should say’ because I had had no experience being the mediator in the studio (or in any professional context) prior to this activity. However once in the studio, I found it was natural for me to simply listen to what the people had to say, and simultaneously make sure that everyone’s opinions had been heard before moving onto initiating a discussion where everyone was able to share what they felt would be the ideal solution to the issue. One of the fundamental aspects of effective group functioning is the members feelings and experience of inclusion (O 'Hara & Weber 2005) and my journal entry provides the feedback I received from my tutor Angela after our studio session, …show more content…
Having the ability to recognise does not however correlate to an ability to affectively demonstrate skills, and in some aspects of communication including working with minorities and other populations that I have limited exposure to, as well as in public situations, I feel that there is room to further development my ability to effectively communicate. Expanding my knowledge and having awareness of these limitations however, is the first step in minimising them and as such I can strive to further utilise the resources available to me at university and at home in order to not only be more successful with my studies at university but to gain the confidence and high quality skillset needed to be successful in the field of social work in which I hope to