The Amazing 'Saidat Show'

Wow! Today we enjoyed participating virtually in the 'Saidat Show' presentation. What an amazing experience it was! Saidat exudes such positive energy. She had us up out of our seats and learning a dance, shouting at the top of our lungs and participating in a variety of educational exercises.  Saidat's message was inspirational and taught us so much.  One thing we learned is that a 'worldview' is a collection of ideas that each of us has about the world in which we live. Our individual worldview is shaped by our personal experiences.  It is important that we challenge our worldview and try to avoid stereotyping others because this will only limit our thinking rather than promote openmindedness and inclusion. Saidat taught us three important life lessons: LOOK! LISTEN! LEARN! We need to listen with our hearts, pay attention to the world around us and try to avoid judgements and stereotypes. If we try to do this it will help us to maintin open hearts and minds.  It will also help us to learn more about others and the wonderful world in which we live which promotes inclusion. She reminded us that the beauty of the world in which we live is that it is diverse. Diversity is a fact....but inclusion requires individual action! In one exercise she split the students up into two groups and asked them to shout out all the things they know about their teacher (me - eek!).  The scorekeeper had to listen only to the spokesperson in the group which was challenging as everyone on the team was shouting out ideas at the same time! Each team kept score. We repeated the exercise two more times....share everything they know about our school and then lastly, about current events in the world. When it was all done, she asked us to consider our ideas. Were we really sharing FACTS about the topic or just things we think we know? How can we learn to LOOK, LISTEN and LEARN so that we can better distinguish between fact and fiction? What was the challenge of listening to just the spokesperson when everyone was shouting out ideas at the same time?  In the end, we learned that we need to drown out the 'noise' that sometimes clouds our judgement and really try to listen carefully to what others are saying.