Diversity as a garden of flowers !

A response to the Misunderstood Activity
created by NIsha Sheen (@NSheen)

Number of views: 183


In my discipline, one frequently misconstrued concept is ‘diversity’.In Healthcare and General Education courses, learners tend to associate diversity with ethnic and cultural differences.The broad spectrum of diversity such as personalities, abilities, functions etc are often overlooked.This may be attributed to their prior knowledge and experience or societal factors or implicit bias.I think one strategy to undo this is to incorporate a broad range of perspectives and dimensions of diversity into teaching materials and fostering open dialogues.

To make the concept of Diversity more understandable , I would use the analogy of a garden to break it down to digestible chunks.Imagine a colourful an d vibrant garden with a variety of flowers in different colours, sizes, shapes, height,and scent, symbolizing the diversity in people’s appearance and backgrounds and dynamics. Different plants and flowers thrive in different intensities of sunlight, water, shade etc which represent human beings’ diverse abilities, needs and requirements to thrive. So , just like a garden in full bloom, diverse groups of human beings thrive their best when their differences are recognized and embraced.

Biodiversity photo by Stock photo/think stock from https://www.floridatoday.com/story/life/home-garden/spaces/2016/10/11/bio-diverse-garden-happy-garden/91889638/