OT 532: Life Skills Group
Description
On Friday, February 23rd, I facilitated a group session by my self. The group theme was "life skills" and I lead my group in a discussion about child care. I began the group by introducing myself, along with explaining what the session would consist of, how long it would be, the general rules of respect, and I also had the group members introduce themselves before beginning the ice breaker. The ice breaker required the group members to think of words to describe how they would be as future parents and it had them putting themselves into a specific category of a particular parenting style they believe they would follow. Afterwards, everyone in the group was given a survey to fill out, which would give them a good idea of where they were in their knowledge of becoming a new parent. I then went over the answers and had everyone share what they put for the bonus question, which was guessing the cost of taking care of a child from birth to 17 years old. After going over the answers, I had the group members talk about one thing that made them nervous and one thing that made them excited when it comes to caring for a child. To wrap up the group meeting, I had everyone think back to everything that we had done and thought about during the session, which then everyone was instructed to come up with a scenario of when and how they would apply their parenting style. The group was concluded with a discussion on what populations this topic could benefit.
Interpretation
For me, the most significant part was when everyone in the group shared things that they are nervous and excited about. After going through all of the group members, it was obvious to me that everyone took the activity very seriously and that everyone had legitimate concerns about becoming a parent. I think the biggest ideas that stuck out to me was when someone mentioned that they were concerned about having a child and then losing the child and when someone else mentioned that they are afraid to bring a child into the frightening world we live in now. These were great examples of very real things that people are scared of and it helped shine some light for other members in the group that might not have thought of the same things. At first, I thought that the group members would put things like "changing diapers" and "feeding" for something that they are nervous about. Overall, it was great that the group members took the session seriously and really opened up on how they felt about certain things. At first, I didn't think that they would enjoy the session or think that it could relate to them for the time being, but I was proven wrong. This could be because the group members are at the point in their lives where having a family is closer now than it ever has been before. This is different from usual group sessions because this is not information that the group members can apply to their lives right now, but it is definitely something to think about for the future.
Outcome
Having experienced my first solo group facilitation, I now feel more confident in my abilities for future fieldwork experiences and even in future practice. I think that this group session went well and that I can apply what I did and the feedback that I received to help me improve my group facilitation skills and become an even better group leader. This makes me feel more confident and I look forward to leading more groups and getting to experience the different people that may be in the group that day. Going forward, I believe that I can do great work and possibly make a difference or an impact in someone's life, through my group facilitation. I feel that my feedback was good and something I can learn from. In the future, I will be more relaxed in my facilitation and let things come more naturally.
On Friday, February 23rd, I facilitated a group session by my self. The group theme was "life skills" and I lead my group in a discussion about child care. I began the group by introducing myself, along with explaining what the session would consist of, how long it would be, the general rules of respect, and I also had the group members introduce themselves before beginning the ice breaker. The ice breaker required the group members to think of words to describe how they would be as future parents and it had them putting themselves into a specific category of a particular parenting style they believe they would follow. Afterwards, everyone in the group was given a survey to fill out, which would give them a good idea of where they were in their knowledge of becoming a new parent. I then went over the answers and had everyone share what they put for the bonus question, which was guessing the cost of taking care of a child from birth to 17 years old. After going over the answers, I had the group members talk about one thing that made them nervous and one thing that made them excited when it comes to caring for a child. To wrap up the group meeting, I had everyone think back to everything that we had done and thought about during the session, which then everyone was instructed to come up with a scenario of when and how they would apply their parenting style. The group was concluded with a discussion on what populations this topic could benefit.
Interpretation
For me, the most significant part was when everyone in the group shared things that they are nervous and excited about. After going through all of the group members, it was obvious to me that everyone took the activity very seriously and that everyone had legitimate concerns about becoming a parent. I think the biggest ideas that stuck out to me was when someone mentioned that they were concerned about having a child and then losing the child and when someone else mentioned that they are afraid to bring a child into the frightening world we live in now. These were great examples of very real things that people are scared of and it helped shine some light for other members in the group that might not have thought of the same things. At first, I thought that the group members would put things like "changing diapers" and "feeding" for something that they are nervous about. Overall, it was great that the group members took the session seriously and really opened up on how they felt about certain things. At first, I didn't think that they would enjoy the session or think that it could relate to them for the time being, but I was proven wrong. This could be because the group members are at the point in their lives where having a family is closer now than it ever has been before. This is different from usual group sessions because this is not information that the group members can apply to their lives right now, but it is definitely something to think about for the future.
Outcome
Having experienced my first solo group facilitation, I now feel more confident in my abilities for future fieldwork experiences and even in future practice. I think that this group session went well and that I can apply what I did and the feedback that I received to help me improve my group facilitation skills and become an even better group leader. This makes me feel more confident and I look forward to leading more groups and getting to experience the different people that may be in the group that day. Going forward, I believe that I can do great work and possibly make a difference or an impact in someone's life, through my group facilitation. I feel that my feedback was good and something I can learn from. In the future, I will be more relaxed in my facilitation and let things come more naturally.
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