20 March 2015

Last Friday, we watched the movie, Freedom Writers (2007).

Freedom Writers is based on a book co-written by Erin Gruwell, a teacher, and her students from the class harboring the racial integration plan. It speaks of the real life occurrences that happened in their classroom, as well as her student’s experiences in the streets, and how they developed a unique teacher-student relationship despite the apparent difference in culture and beliefs.

What I liked about this movie is how it showed that we’re not that different from each other. Everyone is unique and to some, the difference is more apparent, but we all have a common ground where we can understand each other. As a teacher, this common ground should be exploited to facilitate learning better. Meet the students half-way by looking into their interests and motivations while still employing what you need to teach. For our clients, knowing them and building rapport will play a big role in the compliance of the client during treatment.

The teacher in the movie used a lot of strategies to facilitate not only learning, but behavioral change in the students. I think behavior is the hardest to correct as a therapist because it usually stems from something beyond us. There are a lot of reasons why people behave the way they do and a lot of patience and compassion is needed for us to help our patients. We can also try to employ strategies to motivate them to participate by making the activities relevant to their daily living or their long-term goals.

Being a teacher looks hard and tiring but seeing this movie made me realize that all those hardships are probably worth it when you see that you’ve changed someone’s life. I think the same goes for our profession and that makes me happy that I'll one day be a physical therapist.