A leadership role I was currently tasked with was being a Teaching Assistant (TA) in my Leadership CUE. I led a class of 13 other students in a lesson on Building Peak Habits with a PowerPoint presentation that included educational content, interactive class activities, and multiple class discussions. This experience strengthened my skills in leadership and organization by having to collaborate with my professor to plan an entire lesson for my class and then manage the class for 75 minutes.
One part of this experience that was difficult for me was speaking in front of an audience for such a long amount of time. Likewise, at times, I felt that it was hard to get the class to speak on their experience with building new habits and breaking old ones. Habits can be personal so sometimes the class was reluctant to participate in class discussions. While the silence did become uncomfortable, it was provided for me to set up as a leader openly sharing my experiences with habits. I became a role model to my peers in this moment while also providing them with educational information which was a very rewarding experience. I have always felt comfortable commanding a room but doing it for this duration was confidence-building for me. Speaking for 75 minutes on educational content and personal experiences was intimidating, but it was enriching to see the class embrace the information being delivered and be responsive to the sharing of my experiences with habits. This experience will be one I reflect on often when approaching future leadership roles.
I have attached my TA session presentation to demonstrate the skills I acquired in leadership, along with a reflective paper describing the experience.
