Blog 7 - Second Interview Preparation

1.  Who is your mentor and where do they work?  If their workplace does not reflect their expertise, what makes them an expert?

• My mentor is Jessica Sosa, and she is a kindergarten teacher at Berlyn Elementary. I feel that she has been teaching for a long enough time now to have gained the proper skills and knowledge on managing a classroom and ensuring learning. 

2.  What five questions will you ask them about their background?

• Where did you go to school and what did you major in?
• What motivated you to pursue a career in this field?
• What would you say was the first hands on experience you got in teaching?
• What are some challenges you've had to overcome as an elementary school teacher? How did you overcome these challenges?
• After completing your secondary education, did you feel prepared to enter a classroom setting?

Blog 6 - Advisory Prep

1. What has worked well for you concerning senior project this year?  What has made it a positive experience for you?   

• What has worked for me so far is being able to mentor at a place where I am very comfortable and able to get hands on experience on teaching children. It's been a positive experience, because I know that what I'm doing at my mentorship is appreciated by the kids and teachers that I am woking with. 

2. What are you finding difficult concerning senior project?  How can you adapt to make that portion work better for you?  How might the senior team help?

• What I have found difficult about my senior project is narrowing down my topic to something specific. Research checks are what have helped me find specific things that I might be interested in, but overall I'm not sure what I'd like to focus on. As time goes on however, I'm sure I can narrow it down. 

Blog 5 - Interview 1 Reflection

1. What is the most important thing I learned from the interview?  Is there anything I would do differently for other interviews?

• I learned from this interview the importance of the student-teacher relationship. Throughout the whole interview my mentor kept on going back to how much teachers learn from their students, not just the other way around.  Something I would do different for my other interviews is give my interviewee a list of the questions a few days in advance, this will make them feel more comfortable. My first interviewee claims that she was a bit nervous, so next time I'll try to reduce that. 

2. Did I get additional resources and contacts?  What is the most useful?  Why?

• Yes, my mentor gave me some great advice on who I should talk to, and where I should volunteer. The most useful was the organizations that she recommended me to look into. I think that looking into these organizations, and possibly joining them would greatly benefit my senior project and also be a good extracurricular activity for me to do. 

3. What makes my interviewee qualified to help me?

• My interviewee was my mentor, Jessica Sosa. She is a very articulate person who has been a teacher for over seventeen years and because I feel comfortable with her I thought she would be a great first interview. 

Blog 4 - House Advisory Prep

Like most others, what I most want to accomplish with this project is graduating from Ipoly with some sense of direction. This senior project is an opportunity for me to meet people that will help me explore a possible career option as an elementary school teacher. I hope to be able to expand my knowledge and my resources on my topic that will help me learn about the importance of student-teacher relationships and parent-teacher relationships. I would also like to learn more about different teaching methods and which ones work best for personalizing the learning and ensuring understanding among the students. Being a kindergarten teacher is a very appealing career option for me because I enjoy spending time with kids and I believe that teaching students reading and writing basics is a great fundamental imprint a person can make on a kid. THE END.

Blog 3 - First Interview Preparation

My mentor's classroom

1. Who do you plan to interview? Why?

I plan to interview my mentor, Mrs. Sosa, because her seventeen years of experience in  teaching children could lend itself in providing me with inside information on what teaching youngsters is really like. I know she has a vast amount of knowledge on my topic, and as an educator I'm sure she won't mind sharing it with me.

2. What additional questions do you plan to ask?

• What is the most important thing to keep in mind when teaching younger children?
• What type of preparation does a k-6 teacher need?

• Which teaching related relationships do you find most important? (ex: coworker relationship, parent teacher relationship. student teacher relationship,) Why?

• What kind of problems do you encounter most in teaching?
• How are these problems managed?

• What would you change about our education system? Why? 

• How can a teacher ensure understanding among heir students?
• How can the teacher personalize the learning?

Blog 2 - Summer Mentorship

Senior Project Hours

1. List the contact name, phone number, and organization of the person with whom you volunteered.

Jessica Sosa

(909)986-8995

jessica.sosa@omsd.net

Berlyn Elementary School

2. What qualified this person as an expert in your topic choice?  

• Mrs. Sosa was mine and my sibling's first grade teacher, so I know she's a great teacher. She has been teaching for seventeen years, so I believe this makes her qualified to mentor me as a school teacher. 

3. List three questions for further exploration now that you've completed your summer hours.  

• How can a teacher ensure understanding among heir students?
• What type of preparation does a k-6 teacher need?
• How can the teacher personalize the learning?

4. What is the most important thing you gained from this experience? Why?

• The most important thing that I've gained from this experience is perspective. I always thought that being a kindergarten teacher would be fun and easy, but now I see that I was right about the fun part. The teachers are always busy doing a million things at a time. Now I got a behind the scenes glimpse of the kindergarten chaos. 

5. What is your senior project topic going to be?  How did mentorship help you make your decision?  Please explain.

• My senior topic is going to be teaching children. I loved mentoring and helping the little kindergartners because their was never a dull moment. There is always something that needs to get done and although it's tiring work I'm sure that this topic will have plenty for me to research. 

Blog 1 - Senior Final Lesson/Interview Reflection

1. What three lessons were most helpful for you to see, and why?

• The three lessons that I felt were most helpful for me were the presentations about Thai Restaurant Management, Preschool Special Education, and Psychiatric Technicians. I felt that these three were good examples on how a successful senior presentation should go.  

2. List one thing that you learned about the senior project in interviews that will help you get off to a good start?

• During the interviews I learned that research is one of the most important aspects and that I should make sure to choose a topic with a plentiful amount of research sources. 

3. What topic(s) are you considering, and why?

• I am considering the topics of teaching, nursing, or business ownership. I'm considering these because I am legitimately interested in learning more and possibly pursuing these as career option in the future. I also believe that I could find mentors and a lot of research for any of those topics. 

4. What EQ do you think might be interesting to consider in guiding a project like this? (Please don't worry about any sort of formula...we want this question to come from your genuine interest).

• Teaching: How do you engage students deeply in the content of the curriculum?
• Nursing: What is the most effective way for a nurse to provide the best care for the patient?
• Business Ownership: How do you ensure the most profit when owning a small business?

5. What are some ideas you have about finding summer mentorship?

• I can fill out applications to volunteer at hospitals, and summer classes, or I can make phone calls to people I already know who are familiar with either those topics or small business ownership.