During the close of the school year, Philomena Rego and Laura Weber conducted a one-day leadership program for 47 5th graders at an arts-based elementary school in Winston-Salem, NC. The program was designed to bring closure for these students as they moved forward to middle school and create an opportunity to appreciate what they gained from elementary school while identifying their leadership skills which will help them adapt to middle school.
The focus of the morning was creating greater awareness of how experience shapes identity and how their school had played a major role in these experiences. These experiences are some of the building blocks for their leadership development. The training design was learner-center and experiential. Throughout the day we wove in artistic concepts to align with the schools’ mission. Following the traditional Leadership Beyond Boundaries Leadership format, we started with o Social Identity mapping (SI) for the students to begin understanding themselves at a deeper level. The SI map has three components, the “Core” which represents who we are at our truest self, “Given’, which represents unchangeable aspects of ourselves, and then the “Chosen” component represents what we what to have in our lives.. We were amazed by what the students put in their ore – to help others, be an authentic leader, to be a good friend, etc. They were asked what Social Identity has to do with leadership. The responses we received got at the essence of what we hear from adults, the 1) the need to know ourselves so we cannot understand others , and 2) knowing our values and what is at our core we can better connect with others. We closed out the morning with a memory walk. The students walked around the school and identified something they wanted to remember that influence their Social Identity and that they wanted to take with them from the school. Self portrait?
After lunch we focused on how they want to be in the middle school and what would help them in this transition. The students were asked to pick a Visual Explorer image card that represented the leadership qualities that will help them to make their first middle school year the best year. The key ideas presented by the students were developing listening skills, having the courage to stand up for their values, and understanding others. This activity helped them think how they can take responsibility to make it a great year for themselves. We also wanted to help them voice concerns they might have. The students were asked to come up with the skit regarding their concerns or fears about middle school and how they would use their leadership to overcome these fears or concerns. It was interesting that most of the students came up with the skits that represented bullying, not being understood by the teacher, or being pressured to do something they didn’t want to do. At the end of each skit we explored what could help them create a positive outcome.
Finally we had a closing circle where each student shared a learning they got and how they were going to apply it. Some spoke about their understanding of their Social Identity and how that will help them in their new school, others spoke about their memory walk and what they want to keep, and some shared the learning from their skit and about not to allowing others to bully them.
What we found was that elementary school is not too early to help young people think about themselves as leaders through exploring their identity, what they stand for, what they hope to become, how to relate to others, and to see life as a journey marked by passages that offer experiences and learning. It was a great learning experience for us as well and fun to engage this thoughtful and energetic group.
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