By: SFC Cunningham & Cadet Captain Danielle Mrzena
While sitting in the cafeteria at Roberto Clemente Community Academy, you might have overheard someone say, “Fire Team Fortress and Team Evee helped the Clemente JROTC competitive drill team win two trophies! Those are motivated cadet teams!” What a strange name for a drill team, you might say. Yet, it’s not the name of the drill team. There are actually two teams in the sophomore JROTC class!
For the 2016-17 school year, the Clemente Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC) sophomore class will be conducting 90% of class activities in Cadet Learning Teams (CLT). This strategy was inspired by Framework for Teaching Domain 2. The CLTs give cadets opportunities to develop and enhance skills within the IB Learner Profiles, IB Approaches To Learning, citizenship, teamwork, and leadership. During unit one, cadets reviewed leadership and communication skills, taught in freshman JROTC, and were introduced to lessons in team building and group communication.
By the end of week 3, cadets were given the opportunity to form their teams and chose a name for their team that reflects who they are and the goals they hope to achieve. The class continued with lessons in the stages of team development; forming, storming, norming, and performing. Over the next few weeks, teams progressed through the stages with most teams struggling between storming and norming. Cadets discovered that using their IB learner profile traits, especially being open-minded, risk-takers, and communicators, they could successfully complete all assigned group activities. Teams continue to strengthen their collaboration skills, encouraging each other in other classes, as well as in JROTC.