Today was the third and final day of our New Student Orientation, and our second day with extended Mentor Group time. After those first shaky, awkward moments as a Mentor yesterday, today was easier. What made the difference? I realized that I could never be the kind of mentor I really want to be until I dropped the mentor "act." Today I just let go of the notion that being a good mentor means being just like those immediately, automatically and constantly charismatic, pumped people. I realized today, after holding a mentor session just as Myself, that being a good mentor partly means being true to who you are - students can sense sooner than you can yourself that you are being untrue to your nature. I opened our mentoring class by honestly apologizing for my awkwardness yesterday, and by telling my mentees that just like them, I was new to the concept of Mentor Groups, that I look forward to learning this process with them.
Once I became transparent about my own thought processes, mentor group became so much easier and natural, and I gained back some of the ease that I feel when teaching English content classes.
Tweet
No comments:
Post a Comment