Reflection Paper

When I first decided to expand my education, it had been so long since I had been to school, and I was very hesitant. I talked at length about my decision with my husband and with his encouragement, decided to enroll but still was not quite sure which degree program to enroll in. I knew that this was something that I had always wanted to do since I obtained my Associates Degree in Nursing, but I did not have the courage, nor did I want to give up the time with my family and children. I second guessed my abilities and my knowledge because it had been so long since I had been in college. Now that my children are about to graduate high school and

Wasted Youth and constant void. Growing up and entering adulthood can be one of the scariest things to anticipate. Adults tell us to enjoy our adolescence for as long as we can, because it won’t last forever. Maturity has its pros like legally being able to drink, ability to drive etc. yet it holds the other aspects like, liability. Adulthood can be an extremely scary thing to anticipate as we will suddenly be exposed to responsibility. Some youth accept this fact while others try to run.

As I was first raised as a child, the biggest influential individual in my life is my mother. Nonetheless, she comes from a background from how her parents raised her to treat others in the same manner as you would like to be treated. With this standard, this has been the “golden rule” throughout our family today. By belonging to a Catholic Church since I moved back to the state of Pennsylvania before entering the start of 2nd grade, I attended St.Ignatius of Antioch in Yardley, Pennsylvania.

When taking this course at first I was very hesitant on continuing with it because it went against everything I knew growing up in my home. I’m very glad I continued the course because it has offered me so much in opening my eyes on how life is for people who are women, different race, their sexual orientation, gender, and disabled. I never really realized how much I was limited too growing up as a girl, I was expected to be dolce, pretty and quiet. While boys were expected to do about whatever they wanted, they could get dirty, be loud, and cause a ruckus. I experienced this as a kid; my brother wouldn’t get in trouble for doing certain things. If I tried to do what my brother did, I would get in trouble and be told, “A young lady shouldn’t be doing that”. It irritated me so much because I didn’t know why my brother could get away with certain actions and I wasn’t.

Life can change in the blink of an eye. One moment it is smiles and laughter and the next moment it is tears and feelings of hopelessness. I never fully comprehended the reality of this life idea until I was coming to the end of my freshman year of high school. Just like any other day at school, he was radiating with joy and happiness. However, that night many lives changed. It was apparent to me and many others that the radiating joy and happiness was fake. That specific night, May 2, 2017, his joy turned to sorrow and his happiness turned to an excruciating pain. On this very night, my innocence was stripped away and my outlook on life was drastically changed.

The United States has always been known as a melting pot; a country where different ethnicities, cultures, and religions could congregate to in order to escape from conformity. A country where people could go in order to start a family and raise their children in a diverse environment. A place where everyone from different backgrounds is represented and everybody can share their ideals and experiences and feel welcomed. That is what I was told growing up, that is what teachers and mentors engraved into my brain, and it wasn’t until I was seventeen-years-old when I realized that is far from the truth. My language and perspectives are constricted due to the fact I grew up in the United States, and all it took was one trip overseas for me to discover the diversity of the world in comparison to America.

As humans of society, we all crave the respect and friendships of our colleagues. Unfortunately, choosing to walk in my Christian faith made those two components difficult to grasp.

A week before college move-in day, I had to leave behind my strenuous summer job with a heavy heart, wondering if I would ever see my kids ever again. If you have ever worked with young children, you know how exceptionally hard it is to be the perfect balance of fun and energetic, yet responsible and poised. Even though I was a camp counselor for three years, each summer felt like the first. This past summer was just as exhausting as any other year, but it was more momentous in more ways than one. Going into the summer, I knew that it would be my last- seeing that I was moving to Charlotte and I would never see that same group of kids ever again. In May, before it was 95 degrees consistently, I made a promise to myself to appreciate the experience because I would never get another summer like it.

“Because transition is a process by which people unplug into a new world, we can say that transition starts with an ending and finishes with a beginning.” In many ways the previous quote relations to my transition of transferring from Saint Peter’s University to UNC Charlotte. I had to “unplug” from many things in both my academic and personal life, as a result of, transferring to another school.

On my last day with class 3-213, I had the opportunity to conduct an interdisciplinary lesson using nonfiction articles. The articles I used derived from Nonfiction News: African Animal Edition by Cecelia Margo. Accordingly, the students have been studying nonfiction for several weeks and because of this, they had previously learned the various features of this genre. Upon planning for this lesson, I took time to prepare and craft an activity that would promote collaboration and engagement. Thoughtfully, I took into consideration the children that were in the room and adapted my lesson to meet their educational needs. Thus, I decided that I was going to crafted this lesson on the premises of two ideas: (1) tiered-text differentiation and (2) the pairing of advanced and struggling learners. Going into this lesson, I knew that I wanted to ask thoughtful and encouraging questions that would enable students to integrate their prior knowledge and challenge them.

During my first year of highschool, I was held to a higher standard, than my previous years at middle school. A lot of the teachers at my school were preparing us for a college level experience. One teacher, especially, was pretty hard on us and she was the English teacher. The first major paper that was assigned was a research paper that had to discuss a historical event and how that event impacted the world. Since this was my first major paper and I was used to this kind of writing, I ended up writing specifically about Alexander the Great and the wars that he fought in. I specifically detailed the battles and what was going on, but I did not talk about how it impacted the world. My teacher offered to proof read the papers two days before the deadline so we could fix any critical errors. I showed her my paper and she said that if I turned that paper in, I would receive an F on the paper. I always strive to get good grades and to pass with all A’s, so when my teacher said this, I immediately realized how important writing could be and I started to develop my writing skills. All of the factors that were in this situation, made it a rhetorical situation.

A fundamental lesson that stuck with me through my early years of childhood was the importance of loving to write. There are many instances that have influenced me as a writer today, including going through an immense amount of stress from AP classes, writing my own poetry, taking the 5th grade writing exam, and applying to colleges. I developed a love hate relationship with reading and writing and this was strongly influenced by my teachers, parents and tutors throughout the years.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve always been a quiet child. I hated the way I speak and I still do. What I say never matches up to what I think and it is never organized. I hate it when I talk and my heart rapidly races or my stomach begins to hurt out of nowhere. I regret growing up to where I am now with that trait because I feel unhappy with myself and my mind is plagued with negative thoughts as a result. I worry about the future to the point where I can’t focus on the present. These thoughts built up and came crashing down during the time I had to present with my group in front of my teacher during 8th grade for the first round of National History Day. I was nervous, frustrated, and worried. It was the third time we had to present in front of her and I had another project due to her the next day which I needed to work on badly. However, the thoughts in which I tried hard to store away broke loose. When it was my turn to explain my part, I made a mistake and laughed it off. I continued again and messed up. I laughed. I laughed until I started to cry in front of the class. My teacher and teammates comforted me even though I didn’t want their sympathy. However, the fact that they cared for me gave me strength. I wanted to be more confident in myself and to achieve that, I had to be more positive which made me become a nicer person.

In Elizabeth’s classroom there are various activities going on all about Egypt, there are students demonstrating how ancient kings were mummified for burial. The students are learning about Ancient Egypt, but they are doing it in an atypical way. The activities and lessons are not teacher driven, instead the students are working in collaborative groups except one student and they are working on student driven projects. Some students are learning about pyramids. The classroom brings on a new meaning to organized chaos. A teacher who really needs structure in the classroom may have a difficult time with a classroom that is organized like Elizabeth’s. There are a few areas of concern when approaching student driven activities like what is being done in Elizabeth’s classroom. One concern is how can she ensure that all her students are learning the required content. To me this can be done a couple of ways. She could use formative assessments throughout the learning process as a way to assess if the students are learning the content. These can be as simple as observations of the students collaborating together, or as concrete as a pen/paper quiz over the required content. Another way is to establish content specific rubrics that are differentiated to meet the needs of each group’s specific projects. Of course the rubrics need to be presented and reviewed with the students several times throughout the process. Prior to beginning their assignments and then revisited in weekly

Since I took U.S history and AP Government in high school, I was not completely blind to issues regarding the government prior to taking this course. I knew how the government worked in terms of the separations of powers, the bureaucracy, civil liberties and civil rights, and the different branches of it. Therefore, I did understand the function and the purpose of the government, however, I did not understand them all too well to believe that my trust in the government was high. I see the bad in the good, and the good in the bad, therefore, I was skeptical of the government when it came to certain issues. Furthermore, I like to see all sides of an issue before I take a sand on it, this causes me to be confused as to where I stand in regards to my political thoughts and attitudes. Overall, however, I consider myself to be very liberal when it comes to politics and policy making, especially in regard to women’s rights, immigration, education, global warming and the environment, as well as health care. However, I am still confused of where I stand on certain issues, especially regarding issues such as affirmative action. In essence, I am still figuring out what my political thoughts and attitudes are, but the beliefs I currently have are highly due to my political socialization and hopefully with the information I learned in this course I can continue to better understand certain issues and how I identify with them.