Transition Newsletter December 2022
Generosity
Opportunities for generosity happen throughout our day. We can give our time and attention to friends and loved ones, reach out to offer a helping hand to someone in need, or just show a little patience with someone who may be having a hard time. Simply giving someone a compliment or even a smile can make a huge difference in their day.
Generous people tend to build more meaningful connections and become less isolated. Being appropriately generous towards others also helps to build self confidence as well as a sense of purpose.
At Transition, we not only participate in many volunteer opportunities within our community, we are also always looking for more ways we can demonstrate generosity with our classmates and co workers as well as community members.
As we enter the Holiday season, it is a great time to focus on generosity, both giving and receiving, showing empathy for ourselves and for others, finding opportunities to volunteer, and supporting our surrounding communities. We all have the ability to make a positive difference!
Psychology Corner with Ani Poladian
December’s theme is generosity–the quality of being kind and generous. Executive functions are the mental processes that help us engage in organizational skills, like planning ahead and managing our time. Executive functioning skills can help us engage in acts of generosity–like planning a surprise for a friend or family member such as purchasing and wrapping a small gift or cooking a special meal for them. Executive functions also help us engage in higher-order learning skills, like decision-making and behavioral self-monitoring. Lots of adults struggle with executive functioning skills, however there are lots of strategies and tools that we can use to support our executive functions.
One strategy to support planning skills is making and using a checklist. Making a checklist allows us to break down and think through the smaller, individual steps or tasks that are needed to successfully complete a job. A checklist also acts as a visual tool, helping us understand what we need to do in order to be successful as well as allowing us to check off what we already have gotten done.
Our daily lives are replete with opportunities to utilize checklists. A shopping list is a kind of checklist that we often use. Making a shopping list is a way to plan ahead for a trip to the store. These checklists can include text, visuals, or both.
A daily planner is another kind of checklist. We might plan to make dinner, clean the kitchen, and fold laundry after school or work. That in itself can be a checklist.
After work checklist:
Make dinner
Clean the kitchen
Fold laundry
We can also break these tasks into smaller steps.
Checklist for folding laundry
Separate laundry by clothing type
Place shirts on hangers
Put shirts in the closet
Fold pants
Put pants in the closet
Match socks
Put socks in the dresser drawer
The possibilities are endless!
The holiday season can bring a sense of caring, generosity, giving, and empathy. For many people, the ability to contribute to and be a part of a community is important. Our students have participated in a variety of events related to giving back including volunteering at Bernie’s Book Bank!
There are many activities surrounding generosity and giving during the holidays that allow you to incorporate language skills! You can plan a charity event like a canned food drive, discuss where you will donate, what you may need to donate, and who you will be donating or giving to. You can also give your time by helping others. Maybe you’re helping cook in the kitchen or clean around the house, lending a helping hand can be a great, generous way to give! When planning these activities, you can involve other students and peers! Students can share their opinions on certain activities during the planning process, they can work on turn-taking, answering and asking questions, and working as a team.
Random AACts of Kindness:
You can use your device to leave kind words, comments, wishes, or notes! Some examples:
You’re great!
You’re awesome!
Good work!
Happy holidays!
Have a great day!
This month, our students are learning how to engage in continuous vocational activity whether it is our Transition Center Vocational lab, volunteer work, at an internship site, through a training course, and/or within a paid job experience. Research studies state “generosity in the workplace and helping others improves the helper’s own mood as much, if not more, than the recipient of the help.”
We really put this into action by presenting thank you cups to each employer that works closely with our students. Students handmade the cups and then personally delivered them to their bosses to make their day a little easier and little brighter. Since this generous activity was rolled out, students and employers together have built a better rapport; are more collaborative; and provide more support to the work colleague. This was a great way for our student employees to make a difference and also show generosity to their amazing superiors.
