Sheila Franco

April 1, 2016
Marilyn Fichman
Advisory
Habit of Mind Reflection

Throughout my senior year at Blackstone, the Habits of Mind that I felt were my
strengths were Community Engagement, Creativity, Gratitude and Self-advocacy. One habit that
I have that I never realized was important was self-advocacy. Now as the school year comes to
an end, I have much more confidence in myself and believe in my self-worth. Ive taken my life
into my own hands and am trying to direct myself into the right direction. Although I do receive
help of some kind, most of the time its just me making my own choices in life.
Another Habit of Mind I consider my strength is Community Engagement because I
recently started demonstrating this in school. This Habit of Mind is shown when I help teach
Peace, Love and Brain on Thursday long block. The class is about teaching the importance of
mental health and to spread awareness. This class helps Blackstone become aware of the stigma
that comes with mental illness and helps students become open minded on the issue. In addition,
for my senior project, I have created a connection with the National Alliance of Mental Illnesses
of Rhode Island (NAMI) to create a childrens program about identifying emotions and having
an healthy way of expression said emotion. The curriculum that I have started to create should
kick of towards the end of April.
Gratitude is the Habit of Mind I feel I constantly demonstrate both in and outside of
school. Blackstone gives me the opportunity to have a close relationship with my teachers that I
would never have gotten at any other school. I have random conversations with my teachers that
I would normally have with a friend and I enjoy them. My friends are also people I deeply
appreciate. Many have already graduated and left Blackstone but I was able to make new friends
with the current senior class. I am grateful towards them because they have helped me overcome
several obstacles this year from help in school or help with personal problems.

Every year at Blackstone, the Habit of Mind of Creativity always seems to be my

strongest one that constantly develops over the years. Since I was little, I have loved colors and
drawing. Although I wasnt good at first, with practice my skills improved and I am now
confident with my artwork. This year, sadly I didnt take any art classes. To make up for this I
used my creative skills in other classes. In Urban Fresh, I worked hard in my cooking and baking
skills to the point that now Im confident in creating meals and pastries for family and friends. In
English, we are studying Shakespeare, in which we are learning to act. Most students have been
awkward in the acting but many have said that my acting skills are on point. Because of this, I
would be glad in giving tips and help guide others in my creative flow.
Some Habits of Mind that I can definitely keep improving on are Organization,
Optimism, Zest, and Upstanderness. Optimism is the Habit of mind that Im slowly but surely
improving on. Throughout my high school years, I began to believe that my life wouldnt get
better and that happiness was something far away from me. My depression grew and grew to the
point that I had to go to a mental hospital. Because of this I had several problems at home that
affected the way I viewed school life and my personal life. I slowly lost my motivation during
the last semester as my grades slowly started to decline. At the end, I rushed to get them back up
which in some classes I have failed to do so. During the time, I felt that my problems would
continue and only get worse. With the help of my friends, family, and teachers, I was able to get
back on my feet and slowly transition back to seeing the bright side of situations. Last year I said
that I had started in improving but I wasnt quite there yet. This year I can confidently say that
my emotional problems have improved tremendously! There are times where I do still panic and
my anxiety overcome me but most of the time I know how to handle it.
Ah, organization, my great enemy. Before I used to do a folder and binder system to keep
papers organized. The problem with this is that I ended up losing papers or misplacing them. For
a couple of years, I just continued to get more binders and more folders and more notebooks to
see if it would improve my organization. Sadly it didnt. So I looked outside the box and talked
to my teachers about putting most of my assignments online. They agreed and now I take notes,
write papers, and plan my schedule on Google Drive. On the drive, I have multiple folders, by
classes and year, to keep my papers organized. Compared to years before, I feel that with this
system, my organization skills have improved greatly.

Upstanderness is another fairly developed Habit of Mind that I have and still greatly
improving! This year, I have talked to the whole school multiple times during morning meeting
or in making announcements for people. This year with the expansion, there are many students
that are still not understanding that Blackstone is an accepting place (Its almost the end of the
year, seriously). Because of this, many students use crude language when addressing people.
Many times I have not hesitated to speak with a student and if the issue arises again, I took the
issue to the advisor. Again Blackstone is an accepting community and should stay like this.
Despite having many Habits of Minds as strengths, there are still some that I consider
weaknesses. This year were Wellness and Zest. Of these three Habits of Mind, I struggle most
with Wellness. To be honest, I do not actively work to maintain a healthy state of being. For the
most part, I get roughly between 4-6 hours every night or sometimes I am unable to sleep.
Though this has improved now over the course of the year, I still think 5-7 hours might not be
enough for me. This year I have taken 2 gym classes. I honestly see this as improvement but my
involvement in the class is definitely lacking.
Zest is the Habit of Mind that just seems completely out of character for me in certain
situations. For the most part in class, I normally dont participate as enthusiastically in classes
unless the topic is compelling and I enjoy what Im doing. I usually participate in a casual
manner. In almost all my classes, I participate and take what I can out of what Im learning, but I
dont demonstrate that Im actually enjoying what Im learning or am interested in it until I speak
one on one with a teacher. Maybe Im just quiet.
Lastly, I wanted to address Humility and Grit. I stated towards the beginning that I
improved on. Humility and Grit are the Habits of Mind that I believe I improved on the most! I
understand my strengths and weaknesses, I always have but I never acted on them. This year I
have! Seriously, my grades show it! Yes, Im still not an honor student and there are times that
were definitely close calls but I still managed to get through it!