Skip to main content

Coming of Age Ceremony!

Hi guys!

 Today's blog is brought to you by myself, Rylee Booth, and Allie Cullen (check out their blogs if you have time!).

Adolescence is a time when emotions essentially control the mind and make it difficult to think rationally. There comes a time when an adolescent begins their journey into adulthood and must learn how to think, act, and regulate for oneself. The purpose of a coming of age ritual is to break from the norms that characterize adolescence. While some coming of age transitions are planned and purposeful, some events force adolescents into the transition to adulthood. 

 As Maslow’s hierarchy illustrates, safety is imperative, on all levels, for self-actualization to occur. In accordance with this philosophy, Vygotsky emphasizes the importance of social interaction through his concept of scaffolding, and how it is essential to cognitive development, especially throughout adolescence. Using the various philosophies of Maslow and Vygotsky to guide our design, while also addressing the characteristics of adolescents in this stage, our coming of age ritual is geared toward the development of self awareness,  balance, and patience while also instilling in adolescents perseverance. 

 The basis of our coming of age ritual stems from the premise of the ABC News show called “What Would You Do?” The show uses hidden cameras to observe people in staged situations while host John Quinones narrates and comments on their behavior. The show’s purpose is to highlight and analyze human nature and essentially determine people’s character, delving more deeply into the rationale behind their decisions. Following a similar format, our ritual designs scenarios to teach adolescents about the character traits and values needed to enter into adulthood as they prepare senior year of high school. We decided to use the show’s premise in our coming of age ritual because we think that, while it will be staged, the adolescent will have a natural and authentic response rather than be aware that they are involved in a coming of age ritual.

 Over the course of the adolescent’s junior year of high school, three teaching moments will occur and will be secretly filmed. To reduce anxieties from anticipation, the adolescent will have some warning on the timing of these situations. Important adult figures in the adolescent’s life will meet with the adolescent two to three weeks prior to share their wisdom and give them an indication as to when the situation will occur. This sharing of wisdom prepares the adolescent so they are not paranoid or laden with fear about the coming of age experience.

Below is the link to our PowToon explaining the Coming of Age ritual. We hope you enjoy it!
Coming of Age PowToon!

 Thanks!

 Kayla, Rylee, and Allie
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Exploratory Project: Project-Based Learning!

PROJECT BASED LEARNING “ A dynamic classroom approach in which students actively explore real-world problems and challenges and acquire a deeper knowledge ” (Edutopia, 2019). INTRODUCTION Project-based learning (PBL) is an instructional approach used by teachers to increase student engagement and create meaningful connections between the classroom and the real-world. PBL is not equivalent to traditional school projects. The chart on the right emphasizes the differences between projects and project-based learning. PBL challenges students to “ work on a project over an extended period of time – from a week up to a semester – that engages them in solving a real-world problem or answering a complex question ” (What is PBL?) . The project typically ends with a presentation given to an audience outside of the school community demonstrating the skills and knowledge gained. PBL helps “ students develop deep content knowledge as well as critical thinking , creativity , and communi
4 comments
Read more

Educational Theorists

Teaching styles vary from teacher to teacher. However, most teachers have one or two educational theorists that they relate to the most. After learning the basics of about five theorists, I found that I relate to Abraham Maslow and Lev Vygotsky. Maslow was an American psychologist who created a hierarchy of needs, predicting that in order for a human to reach self-actualization (in order for students to focus and learn in school), he or she must fulfill basic human needs first (they must have a solid foundation in which they feel comfortable in). The below chart shows Maslow's hierarchy of needs in greater depth. The base tiers of physiological and safety needs emphasize the need for a guarantee of food, water, warmth, rest, safety, and security before anything else can be considered. The middle tiers include belongingness and love needs as well as esteem needs. These incorporate the need for intimate relationships, friends, and strong self esteem that can be focused on o
5 comments
Read more

ELL Placement

In my adolescent development class, we were assigned a weekly placement in a neighboring school. Different students in the class have different roles in each of the schools they visit. I have been paired up with a 16-year-old girl named Binsa from Nepal (note that I have changed her name for privacy and confidentiality). Binsa came to the United States in 2015 and is in the beginning levels for speaking, listening, reading, and writing English. Nepal is a Himalayan country in South Asia landlocked between China and India with the rough population of 27,474,000. The official language is Nepali and it's spoken by 44.6% of the population. Hindu is the predominant religion in Nepal with 81.3% of the population practicing. Nepal was closed to the outside world until the 1950s. It is one of the world's poorest countries with the bulk of the economy relying on tourism and aid from other countries. In April of 2015, a devastating earthquake hit, killing thousands of people, des
1 comment
Read more