General Education Capstone Journal

Question descriptionPlease respond to all the following items in your reflection journal.

How do Communication skills connect with the course material this week? How did Communication skills help you with your research this week?

Write down at least one specific aspect of Communication that you need to still develop and describe how you could work on developing that aspect.

How does Communication connect to achieving your career goals?

Based on your work in the course as well as general education courses at Grantham University, explain what Communication means to you.

Describe a specific assignment, presentation, or project you worked on in one of your past courses at Grantham University that allowed you to develop your Communication skills?

Write down at least one question you have about your organization, your research project, or this course in general?

WEEKLY CONTENT:

Mentoring

There are two main types of mentoring. Hierarchial mentoring occurs between two people who occupy different social positions or social locations. Peer mentoring occurs in a relationship where a more experienced student helps with a less experienced student in improving overall academic performance. This improvement can result when the mentor includes support, advise, and knowledge.

A significant role of a mentor – regardless of which type of mentoring is prevalent – is to encourage reflection (that’s why we addressed reflection already!) as we now understand the connection between reflection and learning. The mentor can guide the mentee to accomplish this reflection (especially during the service-learning project) by asking the following, which in turn the mentee can reflect upon:

Identify issues which may need to be addressed

Reflect on similar experiences

By asking probing and situational context questions, additional tools and resource ideas may emerge.

Leadership and Service-Learning

Historically, leaders came to be leaders because they were either just made that way; possessing the characteristics and traits traditionally seen in a leader, or they were “in the right place at the right time”. With modern leadership theory, these ideas have changed.

A transformational leadership style emphasizes the role a leader plays in transforming the outlook and actions of other group members so the focus is not on the individuals themselves, but members think about what is good for the entire organization or society as a whole. A servant leadership style seeks to transform others, but places the emphasis on empowering others while still meeting their own needs.

In general, leaders have to evaluate not just their own goals, but the entire population that the leader works with – this could be just a small group, or the global population as The President of the United States has to consider. Any leader must also consider the cultural diversities we discussed in Chapter 5.

There are two specific achieving leadership styles – Connective Leadership and Direct Leadership. Each of these styles are directly linked to effective leadership and incorporate the concept of a director, connector, or persuader.

• Director – Leader who utilizes power and authority to lead by telling others what to do. This type of leader will use technology to influence and control other group members.

• Connector – Leader who specializes in the relational leadership style. This type of leader is more interdependent and values cooperation while enjoying the social aspect of group members.

• Persuader – Leader who specializes in the instrumental leadership style. This leader tries to use resources to help persuade others to adopt the positions of the leader or take on tasks reflective of the persuader’s goals.