Reflection Essay

When I first got accepted into Stuyvesant High School, I heard countless of rumors stating: “Oh the workload is terrible”, “The competition is so fierce” or “Out of schoolwork, extracurriculars, or sleep: you can only pick two.” I found it hard to let it faze me, since I graduated from one of the most prestigious middle schools. However, the rumors transformed into reality when I stepped into Mr. Nieves’ Freshman Composition Class. The workload at the beginning of the year was brutal, coupled with assignments from other core classes that seem unaware of the workload of other teachers. Reading assignments were a regular, and there were journal entries and occasional quizzes to keep us in line. What made it bearable was the friends I made in that class; everyone had their own opinion about the topic we were talking about, and listening to other perspectives really broadened my horizon and enriched my learning experience in Stuy. Another thing that this class has taught me is the importance of time management, a skill that I will carry on for the rest of my high school career and life. When I choose to sign up for Mr. Nieves’ AP American Literature class in my Junior Year, I was hoping to relive the discussion-based lesson plans and meet more outstanding peers. I was not disappointed, to say the least, reflecting through all the experiences at the end of the course. The lesson plans he laid out for us were an interesting mix between small lectures and class output, and what I

It is still so surreal to reflect back on my first semester as an incoming college student in the ENC1101 course, analyzing at my progression as a reader and writer in literacy. Since the first day of class I set in stone my goals for this class: receive a 4.0 GPA, develop my connecting theories skills in writing, and become more aware of objectives for each Unit throughout the course. All of these goals became achievements that not only make others proud but most importantly give me self pride. In order to earn the grades and achieve these goals, I went after every opportunity that I was given as an incoming college student, such as office hours and extra credit. By taking this course I have gained confidence with the utilization of literacy, and made an addition to my group of impactful literacy sponsors. Once students are finished with high school they assume that there is nothing else to learn beyond the stereotypical five paragraph essay, but they are so wrong. I was able to obtain so much knowledge about numerous course concepts from Writing about Writing, articles, and my professor. These concepts will carry on with me throughout a bright future of writing courses, job interviews, and any other skills that require literacy. The four outcomes listed below will help illuminate how I improved as a writer, by being a driven college student and going out of the way to earn my achievements in this course. In the first outcome I improved comprehending scholar texts,

I have contributed actively to achieve excellence in teaching, scholarship, and service. In the area of teaching, I have successfully taught one of the multi-section core chemistry courses (i.e., CHEM I and CHEM I-lab courses) and an upper-level course, Survey of Instrumentation for non-chemistry majors. As described in faculty plan, engaging and motivating students to promote their learning is one of the important teaching objectives as an educator. I have demonstrated excellence in teaching by active collaborative learning inside the classroom. Students actively involved in collaborative group assignments by working in pairs or small group to find solutions to challenging real-life situation problems. I utilized “Think-Pair-Share”

I spent the first years of my life in Pensacola, Florida. I was raised by a single parent, my Mom, and learned a lot about independence and women’s rights. Pensacola is a Navy town and she worked at the base. She would invite Navy people to our home during the holidays which taught me a lot about diversity. I learned a lot about from the people that came to visit and we had good times. They were in all colors and from various parts of the country. By the time I was in school, I had no fear of people different than me because of my exposure at home. In high school desegregation and bussing was taking place. Tension was running high and fights were breaking out nearly daily. A mixed-race group of us met at a girl’s house with the idea that we had no significant or insolvable differences and that we needed to find a way to stop the violence. We had a productive meeting and found common ground. The meeting took hold and the word got around that things needed to calm down. We needed the police to leave campus and we needed to take care of our own problems. It was a valuable experience. After High School, I went to a 2-year college and got a degree in Law Enforcement. That didn’t take hold well as my experience with the local police department was not good. I found them to be junk yard thugs, violent, and sex offenders of sorts. It was also a time I discovered my true love: skydiving. A friend of mine talked me into making my first jump with him. I was always fascinated with the

For my tutoring component for READ class, I had the opportunity of continuing to tutor my student Ryken. Eleven-year-old Ryken is an incredibly intelligent student, possessing a large vocabulary, however, he struggles distinguishing phoneme sounds while encoding and decoding. In addition to the phonological issues, Ryken’s eyes were crossed when he was young until he got glasses to help the issue. Because of his delayed literacy skills, his parent asked me to tutor him for two, forty-five minute sessions a week. Utilizing the Wilson reading program, I have had the opportunity to tutor Ryken for about thirty lessons. Throughout this time, I have been able to administer testing, teach teach letter sounds, digraphs, blends, closed syllable exceptions, and multisyllabic words.

A red shirt with black jeans. As I approached the building's entrance, I thought nothing of my clothing. Neither did the officers who checked my identification, patted me down, and escorted me. The program coordinator had instructed us not to wear green shirts, to make our clothing distinct from the forest green uniforms of the "inmates." I sat in the classroom, preparing for class, going over readings for the lecture, thinking about possible debate topics, and conversing with the students. A correctional officer entered, glanced around, and declared to the instructor, "There should only be five inmates in here. I'm counting one extra."

Patience is the key in accomplishing anything. My most challenging class this year would be my Math Analysis Honors course. My main struggle was fully understanding the curriculum that I avoided my sophomore year, with Algebra 2 Honors. The curriculum was knowing the domain and range of a graph, I assumed that this notion would stay in Algebra 2 and not follow me into my next math course. Starting off the year, the class was simple as it was review of Algebra 2, however days later I am faced with domain and range. I took tests that dealt with this concept and would always get those specific questions wrong. I remember, my teacher saying how most concepts in math would never go away and would be there when taking math in college. My first thought was getting help right away and was exactly what I did. I stayed after school in the Godinez Grizzly Lounge where I got aid from a tutor who took her time in fully explaining the essential way to understand domain and range. After a couple of weeks attending tutoring sessions with her I felt more confident in working with domain and range and was able to get these questions right on the next test that I had. Learning how to figure out these two concepts on a graph was harder as a result of giving up my previous year. I knew, however that I needed to address the issue differently and that's what I did. Although I may not be an expert, I can now figure it out without having to guess or give up on the question. Aside from a challenging

my senior year of high school, I was the FFA president at Gale-Ettrick-Trempealeau High School. As president, I tried to make sure everything was done on time, but by the end of the year I was a little worn out. Irritated with having to do everything myself I tried to delegate but still ended up doing mostly everything. My officer team had clocked out for the year and I was upset. Sitting in an officer meeting one day before school, I asked my advisor if there was any chance we could talk to some of the officers about participating more, which was mostly about the officers that never came. Instantly he snapped at me in front of everyone else, including my little sister. In summary he told me I was a bad president and that I blame others for my mistakes. I was so shocked that I didn't even respond. I sat silently crying right next to him avoiding all eye contact. This was when it all started.

I have never been a good student. This comes as an utter surprize to most, for one reason. I’m smart. Or so they tell me. Smart, but not good at school. I mean, ask any kid or millennial adult, and they will tell you school sucks. I just got out of highschool, and can guarantee that it still blows. But as my my theory of knowledge teacher would have posed for us to write last year, why does school have such a bad rep? Why do so many students loathe it? (Use documents from in class,as well as outside readings…. ) For every complaint there is about the school system, someone claims to know the answers. I myself have had an odd education in the places I’ve learned, who I’ve learned with, and the levels I’ve learned at. Add an (un)healthy dose of anxiety and depression, and you’ve got a pretty clear snapshot of my time in the public school system. (I mean, I’m still technically in public school, but it's a college, and I’ll get there later.) Of the dissertations of the school system we have done in class, several have rung true for me, but not always for the right reason.

1.0 Prepare an individual reflective submission demonstrating awareness of academic skills required for your learning journey.

Mrs. Annette Hovey, a music teacher at New Rockford-Sheyenne Public School, was busy giving an elementary percussionist a private lesson as I waited outside the music room for them to finish. Mrs. Hovey can be described as a woman who simply loves and embodies music and is dedicated to teaching her students and helping them grow through her inspiring classes. She's slightly shorter than average height with shoulder-length brown hair, and that day was sporting a relaxed look of: blue jeans, turquoise Nikes, a NR-S homecoming t-shirt, and a comfortable looking black and white plaid zip up sweater.

I have participated in Acts of Random Kindness club, whose purpose has been to spread positivity in the school environment. High school students encounter a variety of emotions such as anxiety, stress, and drama. Hence, we have done uplifting projects such as putting nice complements inside books. We have also reached out to teachers by delivering messages of appreciation to their mailboxes. Furthermore, I have partaken in Colts for Animals, whose motive was to spread student awareness in regards to animal cruelty. We invited guest a few times speakers to talk about issues relating to animal abuse. Moreover, as a member of Garden club, I have helped in beautifying our campus from watering plants to picking out the weeds to digging up for new plants.

Upon my enrollment in high school, I joined multiple student organizations. I have been a member of my High School’s marching band, the Sound of Pride (SOP), since the eighth grade and have continued to participate every season. I marched both trombone and euphonium before becoming the Assistant Drum Major as a sophomore in the 2016 season. This past season, I was named the band’s Drum Major, becoming the school’s first junior to ever hold the title. After the conclusion of the marching band season, I perform with the TCHS Symphonic Wind Ensemble for both a winter and spring concert. During the spring, I also perform with the TCHS High Tide Steel Pan Band. I have been a member of both bands since freshman year. At the start of my junior year, I became the pianist for the TCHS Chorus. This year, I also joined the TCHS Drama Club and participated in the club-sponsored One-Act Play titled, “The Great American Talent Show.” Finally, the my sophomore year, I was chosen to be one of the six members of the Georgia Secretary of State Student Ambassadors to represent my high school and Tattnall County. Through this program, my team and I educate our community about how our government works and volunteer at local voting polls and municipalities. I was chosen to be a part of this team again at the start of this semester.

I have always been a person interested with anatomy. Although, when I was younger, I was more concerned about animals (polar bears specifically) to ever take the time to learn more about ourselves. School science classes were the first time that I was actually exposed to human anatomy. From the very beginning I was fascinated. There was one organ in particular that I never wanted to stop learning about; the brain. Whenever teachers in class would stop talking about it I would immediately become slightly less interested in what they were teaching.

Throughout this assignment, I worked hard for success and learned a lot from my mistakes along the way. I strongly believe that I have successfully met the criteria and accomplished the requirements for this rant. I was dressed appropriately, with no bright colors or designed shirts, to prevent any distractions whatsoever, however, I had a smart student look, which I would think is the ideal clothing for a rant topic such as mine. I maintained a steady, slow pace, and I frequently stopped moving and turned my body to the camera. I performed this at times I felt were necessary in order for the audience to understand when I am delivering a main idea or main points. “The fact is that our school washrooms are never fully clean and this really pisses me off”. This is an example of when I stopped walking and turned my body to the camera. This line is one of my main points that I wanted my audience to clearly understand. My setting was adequate and relevant to my topic (Bell High School Washrooms). In the start of my rant, I showed a school sign that displayed “Bell High School”, then I walked past the lockers of my school during my introduction. Soon after, when I was talking about girl’s washrooms, I stopped walking in front of one. Furthermore, when I was discussing the interior defects and unsanitary environment, I placed myself in a male washroom, so the audience can have not only a verbal understanding, but also a visual understanding, which I feel had an impact on how much