The Essential Question for My Research

Essential Question:

"How does the use of brain teasers in class help students develop their problem solving skills and improve their learning environment? Also, how can I persuade teachers at my mentorship to incorporate brain teasers into their lesson plans?"

Over the past two years, I have been able to do a lot of brain teasers with Mrs. Brooksher's class. I like to do this with them because the students think that they are really fun, but I would like to know if it improves how well they learn. I feel like brain teasers helped me learn more in the classroom as I grew up, and I would like to know if it is the same for other students. Also, I am excited to discover if they do promote greater learning because then maybe I can persuade teachers at Chestatee Academy to use more in class. This would allow me to leave a positive impact on the place that has done so much for me. This question does show that I really want to find an answer because it incorporates an action that I would like to achieve by the end of my research.

What My Mentorship Has Been Like / An Influential Class

My mentorship is a lot different from how it was last year. I've been doing a lot more grading for Mrs. Brooksher, and a lot less teaching. This is because Mrs. Brooksher has even more content to cover this year than she had last year, and she also seems to have more grading to do than before. However, I do enjoy getting to learn a different side of teaching than I did last year. Whenever I am not grading, I am helping students one-on-one as I did before. One of the things that is a little disappointing this year is the brain teasers. Because of both Mrs. Brooksher's and my busy schedule, I have barely been able to do any brain teasers with the class. However, I understand that Mrs. Brooksher has to make sure she covers everything she has too.

One class that helped me with my mentorship is the calculus class that I had last year. This is due more to the teacher I had, Mr. Skogman, than the actual class itself. Mr. Skogman is a teacher who is very knowledgeable in his content area and is very likable. This is how I try to model myself after to Mrs. Brooksher's students. He finds a way to explain math in a higher and more academic way than most high school teachers. I try to do this with the students because I feel like it would be good for them to be learn math in a way that will prepare them for high school. Mr. Skogman is highly respected not only for his mathematical ability, but also because of how entertaining he makes class feel. He is able to make students laugh in a very nerdy way. I thought that if I was like this with Mrs. Brooksher's students, than they would see me as the cool high school kid and would be able to learn from me better. I think that modeling myself after Mr. Skogman has worked well, and I this is the type of teacher I will be.

Youth in the Workplace and Social Intelligence

Besides experience, the youth face many challenges when entering the workplace. One of which is the ability to have a relationship with coworkers, especially bosses, that are of a different generation. One reason it is difficult is because the culture of today's youth is much different than the culture of older generations. Because of this, young employees and bosses can come off as rude and disrespectful to each other. The following link is to an article that discusses how young potential employees can fix this problem.

http://growingleaders.com/blog/first-soft-skill-develop-students/

This article suggests that the youth lacks social intelligence. Social intelligence is the ability for a person to empathizes with someone and build a connection with them, despite any differences. Social intelligence is important in the workplace because it allows to work to be done between employees despite differences, such as age. This can keep employees and bosses from coming off as rude to each other. Social intelligence also can create a good first impression to a boss for applicants and beginning employees.

Something that I noticed about this article is that it classifies all of the youth into one group. It assumes that all youth is the same, and it points out only negative characteristics about the youth. It also places the blame for the disrespect in the workplace completely on young employees, when bosses are also to blame.