Interpersonal SkillsDuring one of our Psychology 100 classes, we were given an in-class activity and separate into small groups to work on it. The assignment prompted us to imagine that we were all going on a transatlantic yacht cruise together, but when disaster struck we were left in life raft with only 15 specific items. Our goal as a group was to rank those items from most important to least important. Afterwards, our ranking were compared with the coastguard's and the overall difference would determine if and how well we would have survived in that situation. Our group got a total difference of 48 meaning that we were eventually rescued after a while but all survived.
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Which 21st Century Skill do you feel this assignment addresses, and why?
This assignment was one of the few this year where interpersonal skills were actually applicable. I had to use these skills to work with a group, of essentially strangers, to figure out and decide among all of us which items were the most important.
What are you most proud of from this assignment, and why?
The thing I'm most proud of from this assignment is the fact that we survived and were one of the highest-scoring groups, which also meant that we got extra credit.
How did you develop and/or improve upon your 21st Century Skills with this assignment?
This activity was very good at developing my interpersonal skills. Another student and I led the discussion and I voiced a lot of my ideas and opinions to try to both get the best ranking and involve everyone in the decisions. It took a lot of my already developed leadership and interpersonal skills and allowed me to practice and further develop them.
What was most difficult about completing this task?
The most difficult part of this activity initially was finding comprises when someone valued an item higher than some one else or the rest of the group. However, after working together for a while we were more in sync and were able to breeze through the list and the rankings.
How could you improve this work?
We probably could have improved our ranking and score if we had had more time or wasted less at the start being quiet. At the end we were kind of rushed and although we still talked about every item the discussions on them weren't as good as they could've been.
If you could start over, what would you do different?
If I could start over I would have first discussed what the most important categories were rather than just doing it by item. This would've made ranking everything faster and easier and would have been more in line with what the coast guard did meaning that we would have scored much better.
How can you apply this to future learning?
The discussion tools as well as the leadership and interpersonal skills developed from this assignment are things that I'll be able to apply to any discussions I have in the future, be they in class, stranded in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, or otherwise.