Blog 24: Last Presentation Reflection

Presentation

1. What are you most proud of in your block presentation and/or your senior project? Why?

I'm really proud of how much I have grown in presenting through out my senior project. I was nervous for all of my presentations, but I was more comfortable in my final presentation than any of the others. Through out the project I learned a lot of information, and I'm really proud of how my project turned out in general. I was a lot more confident in my final presentation though, and I was able to make time, which is what I was personally the most concerned about.

2. Questions to consider:

A. What assessment would you give yourself on the block presentation? Look back and use the component contract to defend that assessment?

On my block presentation I would give myself an AE. I would give myself this grade because I did everything that was required on the component contract, and went into great detail on each answer. I used multiple sources and explained all of them, and talked about a lot of examples for each answer. A lot of work and planning went into my activity, and it ended up working out really well in regards to my presentation. I also brought in my independent components, and used them to really help me explain one of my answers. 

B. What assessment would you give yourself on the overall senior project? Use your component contract to defend that assessment.

Overall on my senior project I would give myself an AE. I really put a lot of effort into this project and learned a lot from it. Through the different projects that we had to do I was able to gather more information about my project, and I really made things like my independent components count towards my learning experience of the project. I completed all of my project hours, and learned a lot from my mentorships. A lot of effort and planning went into my final presentation as well. Throughout my project I really made sure I was learning as much as possible about my topic, and I really gain a lot from all of the research that I did. Through out my project I was even able to add new components to my project that I hadn't really considered before, such as pollution prevention.

3. What worked for you in your senior project?

I think what worked best for me was constantly looking for new information that I could use with my topic. Through the process for research, my mentorship, and my independent components, I was really able to broaden my topic and figure out what water conservation is all about, and then through that I was able to create my essential question and my three answers. My answers came through a lot of research and work through my mentorship and independent components, so really just making a point of trying find more information helped me greatly throughout my project.

4. If you had a time machine, what would you have done differently to improve my senior project?

I think if I could change anything I would go back to the beginning of my project when I was doing really narrow minded research on what I thought water conservation was. It was only later on that I broadened my range of research and really started to figure out the full extent of what water conservation is and what is so important about it. I think I wish I had found that out sooner so I could have started broadening my research a lot sooner.

5. How has the senior project been helpful in your future endeavors? Be specific and use examples.

This senior project has helped me out quite a bit actually, and in multiple ways. I don't plan on pursuing water conservation as a career, but I do now plan on still helping with water conservation efforts as much as I can, which I didn't really plan on doing before this project. Since water conservation is such an important issue topic there are a lot of groups out there that work towards fixing this issue, and now that I've completed this project I want to put an effort towards joining one of these groups or at least helping where I can. This project has also impacted me too because now I more understand how important of an issue it is, and I have become pretty passionate about it in general. Another thing this senior project has helped me with is getting over my fear of presenting in front of people, and helping me talk for long periods of time. Even though I have gone to IPoly for all four years, where we do a lot of presentations, I was still majorly afraid of speaking in front of my class. This senior project has really helped me grow to be more confident when I'm presenting, and taught me how to plan out a long talk and presentation. I don't generally like talking for long periods of time, so obviously it wasn't really something I was good at. The multiple presentations that we had to do helped me overcome how to not only talk for long periods of time, but also the importance of organizing and talking about quality information. I did really enjoy this project, but it did have its stressful moments, and it did have its moments where I didn't want to do the project any more, but now that the project is over I am actually really grateful for it as I have gained a lot from it and will be able to use a lot of those skills and information in the future.

Exit Interview

Exit Interview

(This is why we need to start protecting water)

1. What is your essential question, and what are your answers? What is your best answer and why?

My essential question is, "What is the best possible way to preserve and protect our water and its ecosystems?" My three answers are education, pollution prevention, and getting active. Out of all three, my best answer is education because people wont be able to fix the problem unless they know about it. Quite a few people have heard of water conservation, but not a lot know all of the facts or what is causing our shortage of water. A lot of people are unaware that whole entire countries are already being forced to pay billions of dollars to clean up polluted water so that they can give their people fresh water. People need to know this is happening if were going to be able to work towards fixing the issue. Further more, people need to know how to fix the issue, so it is important that we also educate the public on how they can help.

2. What process did you take to arrive at this answer?

Through my presentation I began to realize that not a lot of people think that water conservation is a big issue, or that it will never affect them, which is very untrue. The issue is progressively getting worse every single day, and people need to know that its happening. Before we can get anything done to fix the issue, we need to teach everyone what its really all about . At this point I came up with my best answer, which is education.

3. What problems did you face? how did you resolve them?

For a little while a had some trouble finding any new sources, but at the time I want really looking for any real life examples of places affected by water conservation. At one point I heard about the water crisis happening in Rio, and I looked into it. From then on I found tons of places going through water crisis's, including whole entire countries. I was then able to find new sources, and add a whole new piece of information to my project. I also had trouble towards the beginning of the year with finding another mentor. My original mentor had been in Nevada, so I needed a new one one when I came back to California. I wasn't sure what to look for when trying to find a new mentor, and I am a really shy person. In the end with Mrs. Ortega's help I was able to find and call people, and I found a new mentor.

4. What are the two most significant sources you used to answer your essential question and why?

I actually have three extremely significant sources. My first would be my second mentorship. I learned more then anything else from this mentorship, and through my mentorship I was also able to come up with my three answers. My second biggest source would be NASA. A couple years ago, NASA released the results of a study they had been conducting for over ten years, and it changed the way a lot of people view our water. Their survey was done with satellites, which took pictures of the earth, and then from there they where able to figure out that our aquifers are being quickly depleted. This was our first real indicator that we would ever have any problems with our aquifers, so this whole entire experiment is extremely important to my project. My final source is "The Water Project", which is where I first heard about the water crisis's happening in other countries. Through this project I was able to find out about the full extent of each specific problem, and about the projects that they do as well.

Blog 22: Independent Component 2

Independent Component

I, Kyndra Isom, affirm that I completed my independent component which represents 30 hours and 30 minutes of work.

Sources: 

• Brooks, Brad. "AP Test: Rio Olympic Water Badly Polluted, Even Far Off Shore." The Big Story. 2, December 2015. Web. 11, February 2015
• Leguen, Roger. "Water Scarcity." WWF. Web. 25, March 2016.
• Schwartz, John and Wines, Michael. "Unsafe Lead Levels in Tap Water Not Limited to Flint." New York Times. 8, february 2016. Web. 11, February 2016.

For this independent component I have created a commercial advertising the need for water conservation and its importance. In the video I give my the two main problems that water conservation is trying to solve; pollution and lack of water. In the commercial I give numerous examples for each problem, and statistics towards the end. The video itself and finding all the parts for the video took a long time, especially when it came to the music. The video ended up being three minutes long. I also did a story board for my video as well. When I was completely finished with all of that, I went and made a pamphlet that also explained the problem. This pamphlet will help me spread my commercial because on it, I put a QR code of my video. I've already put it up in some places, that I will show pictures of. This component helped me answer my EQ because through this I was able to help educate the public. One of my answers is education, and it is a very important part of my topic, so through this I figured out a way to tell people about the issue at hand.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1gZ9ULlwHRr1Zm78CLMG0c0_14uZJT6wh96ybBlv28eE/edit?usp=sharing

This is the link to my story board!

This is the QR code for my video!

https://youtu.be/t_VlJOOhIx0

Here is also a link to my video!

These are both sides of the pamphlet that I made!

This is an image of the pamphlet at my dads office!

Blog 21 - Interview 4 Reflection

Interview

https://soundcloud.com/kyn9/interview-5

1. What is the most important thing I learned from this interview?

From this interview I learned new terms about water conservation and different ways that big businesses and others can conserve water. I also got a new source that I can use as well. It was interesting to get someone else's opinion on the on some parts of the subject.

2. How will what I learned affect my final lesson? 

I can use some of the terms I learned in my final lesson, and I can use the new information I learned about conserving water and put it towards my third answer. 

Blog 20: Fourth Interview Questions

Interviews

1. Who do you plan on interviewing? What is their area of expertise?

I plan on interviewing one of my mentors workers. He works in the storm water department, so he knows quite a bit about my topic. 

2. Post 20 open ended questions you want to ask an expert in the field concerning your senior project. Your focus should be finding answers to your EQ.

• What is the best possible way to conserve and protect our water and ecosystems?
• Who or what do you think some of the biggest water wasters are?
• What are some ways that the city could help conserve water?
• What are some ways we could educate the public about water conservation?
• Do you think our aquifers are beyond repair?
• Do you believe that it is unnecessary for farmers to grow crops in dry regions? Why or why not?
• What are some ways to conserve water in this drought?
• A big part of your job is to make sure that oil from restaurants and general waste from business is not going down the storm drain. Why is this important?
• What are some ways for an average everyday person to get active and start conserving water?
• Do you think that we should lean more on educating adults or kids about this issue?
• Do you know of any sources I can use to get more information on my topic?
• How important do you think it is that this topic is taught to the public?
• What do you think needs to be focused on the most in this topic?
• Do you think California's lack of water could start to affect other states?
• Have you heard of Rio's water problem? If so, what is you opinion on this?
• Do you think water in other areas of the world could get to be like Rio's water if we don't start protecting the water?
• Why do you think the topic of water conservation is not more talked about?
• Do you think that the prevention of wasting water and pollution prevention should both equally be focused on?
• Whats one way that big businesses can help conserve water?
• Any final comments?

Blog 19: Third Answer

Research

1. EQ.

What is the best possible way to preserve and protect our water and its ecosystems?

2. Answer 3.

The best way to preserve and protect our waster and ecosystems is by getting active in our community and in water conservation projects.

3. 3 Details to support the answer.

The more people we have that are active in trying to conserve water, the more change will happen. We need a large amount of people to be working on fixing this if we ever want to see progress. Having more people working on this project may also influence others to want to make a change. Finally, we need to be active in our community to spread the word about this issue and help others to want to fix it.

4. Research sources to help support your answer.

• http://www.cocoonyourhome.co.uk/section/content/?pageID=534
• http://wateruseitwisely.com/100-ways-to-conserve/

5. Concluding sentence.

In order for us to see change, we need to start getting active out in the world, or even just in our communities. The more people we have trying to fix this, the more change we will see. We need to show people that by just making small changes we can save water, and essentially ourselves, since water is such an essential part of our survival.

Blog 18: Answer 2

Presentation

1. What is Your EQ?

What is the best possible way to preserve and protect our water and ecosystems?

2. What is your first answer?

My first answer is that education ids the best possible way to preserve and protect our water and ecosystems because people need to be taught about the problems at hand before we will be able to make change.

3. What is your second answer?

My second answer is that keeping our water clean is the next best possible way to conserve and protect our water an ecosystems because it plays a major part in conservation and trash greatly affects our environments.

4. List three reasons your answer is true with a real world application for each

Answer 1: Education

• People need to be informed about this problem
• The problem will never be fixed if people don't know about it
• Telling younger generations about it could help them want to conserve when their older

Answer 2: Keeping the water clean

• There are multiple garbage patches in the ocean that are causing great damage
• Unclean water is starting to affect us (Rio, Flint Michigan, Texas)
• Trash is killing over 100,000 sea mammals a year

5. What Printed source best supports your answer?

http://education.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/great-pacific-garbage-patch/

6. What other source supports your answer?

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/cabd453515244bf2b1063e15f6b680c9/ap-test-rio-olympic-water-badly-polluted-even-far-offshore

7. Tie this all together with a concluding thought.

A really large part of water conservation is keeping our water clean, so I really want to emphasize this by making it an answer. Garbage affects marine life every day, and it is quickly starting to affect humans too. The garbage found in the water creates bacteria that is extremely harmful for any life in the water. I cases like the beaches in Rio, the water is so polluted that a lot of people that go into the water catch deadly viruses, such as flesh eating bacteria. In fact, if a person where to ingest just three teaspoons of the Rio water, they would have a 99% chance of getting infected. People need to know how badly our pollution is affecting the ocean an ourselves, and by making it an answer I can inform them as to why keeping our water clean is such an important answer to my question.

Blog 17 - Interview 3 Reflection

Interview

https://soundcloud.com/kyn9/interview-4

1. What is the most important thing you learned from the interview?

From this interview I actually figured out what exactly I want as the main theme for my final presentation. It was actually an idea my mentor (the person I interviewed) gave me. He said "Are we doing enough?" I thought it was a great idea and I want to center my presentation around it. I also got different ways to educate the public, and plan on using some of them if I can.

2. How has your approach to interviewing changed over the course of your senior project?

I noticed I asked a lot more open ended questions, and questions that overall would take some explaining. This was my longest interview so far, being almost twenty minutes long. There where also a lot of silent pauses though the beginning and end, but the interview went really well an I got a lot of good information out of it.

Blog 16: Independent Component 2 Approval

Independent Component

1. Describe in detail what you plan on doing for 30 hours. 

For this component I plan on trying to educate the public about important parts of my topic while trying to learn more about each of my three answers for my EQ. I will study and look into different places that are struggling with water conservation, and take notes and write about what I find. After my study I will make a 2 - 3 minute commercial to try and educate the general public about the importance of my topic and about the places that are struggling with it. The video will take a lot of time since I will be creating, story boarding, filming and editing my commercial. After the video is completed I will be getting a QR code for the video. I will then be creating a pamphlet to promote and teach about the importance of water conservation, and on the pamphlet I will put the QR code for my commercial. I will be handing out the pamphlet to various people, and may hand some around at the school. 

2. Discuss how or what you will do to meet the expectation of showing 30 hours of evidence.

I will be taking notes and writing a lot of information on my study, and then filming and taking alot of pictures for my commercial. I will try to get pictures of me filming as well. Finally I will create The pamphlet, with the QR code on it. All of these things combined should be enough evidence to prove that I have completed 30 hours of the independent component.

3. Explain how this component will help you explore your topic more in depth.

The study will help me find out more about places that are suffering because of lack of water of contaminated water, such as Flint Michigan. Puting together a commercial will help me see what some of the best ways are to educate the public about my topic and show them its importance, and the pamphlet will allot me to get the video around and explain the whole point of the video. Over all the video will help me educate public while helping find out more about my topic.

Independent Component 1

Independent Component

I, Kyndra Isom, affirm that I completed my independent component which represents 33 hours of work.

Sources: 

1.      http://www.livescience.com/39625-aquifers.html

2. http://www.globalchange.umich.edu/globalchange2/current/lectures/freshwater_supply/freshwater.html

3.       http://www.conserve-energy-future.com/various-ocean-pollution-facts.php

4.       https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2015/06/16/new-nasa-studies-show-how-the-world-is-running-out-of-water/

5.       http://education.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/great-pacific-garbage-patch/

6.       http://www.home-water-works.org/indoor-use/showers

http://www.fastcoexist.com/1680051/all-the-water-it-takes-to-produce-a-burger

These are various sites where I got information for my answers and ideas for my questions. Each website is numbered for which question I used that website for. I also got information from a book called "When the Rivers Run Dry" by Fred Pearce.

What I did:

I created a survey to see how much the general public really knows about water conservation. The point of this was to hopefully prove that the public needs to be more educated about certain things involving water conservation. I started by doing research on what I should create my survey on. This was basically so I could try and figure out the important parts of water conservation that people need to learn more about. After that I created the survey and the answer sheet. The answer sheet gave the correct  answers to the survey as well as giving reason as to why it was the correct answer. So while I was taking surveys I was also teaching the public more about this issue. I got a bunch of different age groups for my survey, including kids from Mrs. Thinnes class, family members, and adults from my parents work places. After I got all of my surveys I Compiled all of the information together. I also took some hours from my mentorship and put it towards my independent component. My mentorship is actually where I got the idea to try and educate the public. In my mentorship I started to realize the amount of people that don't know about water conservation. Through this survey I was able to pinpoint the areas that need to be taught the most. The final thing I did for my independent component was my analysis. Through my analysis I was able take the information I got from my surveys and see what needs to be taught more. I took apart each question and its results, and explained what should be done with that information.

Here is a copy of the survey that I gave out, the answers for the questions, and the sources:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1tmIqDyLWcqIpsVNLDtxXyNKRxCZnQCDiLGviJFaVA7k/edit?usp=sharing

Here is my final analysis and the results from every question from the surveys:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1nJWgivNu7Gv9VUbxoPOa0efuau1j4OYtaIHqsilyOHU/edit?usp=sharing

This independent component helped me prove that we need to educate the public more about the topic of water conservation. I also helped me pinpoint the areas that the public needs to know more about. For example, through my survey I found out that most people don't know how much water goes into their everyday lives and most of the food that they eat. This information is extremely important for them to know because it could completely change their perspective on water conservation and make them consider how much water goes into something before they buy it. This really ties into over consumption as well, and how we need to cut back on this in order to lessen the amount of water that is used to make things that we buy. Through my surveys and analysis I also learned that most people already know about aquifers and how much fresh water is on the planet, so I wont need to focus on that as much as other things. I was also able to teach people through out my independent component through my survey and my answer sheet. The answer sheet gave in depth answers to every question that I asked. 100 people took my survey and got an answer sheet, so hopefully through that answer sheet they where able to learn more about my topic and why it is so important. I ended up learning a lot from this component and will hopefully now be able to go forward and teach others more about my topic.

Lesson 2 Reflection

Presentation 

1. What are you most proud of in your lesson two presentation and why?

I am really proud that I made time. I spoke for twelve minutes, and I ended my presentation at 24 minutes an 40 seconds. I did cut it really close, but I'm still really glad that I made time. People also seemed to enjoy my activity, and I ended up having a lot of fund with it, so I am proud of my activity and I plan on using it again for my hook activity in my final presentation.

2. What assessment would you give yourself on your lesson two presentation?

I would give myself a P because I did everything that was required and I made time.

3. What worked for you in your lesson two?

My activity did really well and a lot of people had fun with it. I also noticed that after my activity I got a lot more comfortable with talking in front of the class because I knew they where interested. I also am glad that I practiced beforehand for my presentation so I knew how to space out my time.

4. What didn't work? If you had a time machine what would you have done differently to improve  your lesson two?

If I could go back I would have shortened my activity. My activity ended up being a lot longer than expected, and that didn't give me a lot of time for my conclusion. By the time my activity ended I had about forty seconds left for my conclusion, so I had to kinda speed through it.

5. What do you think your answer #2 is going to be?

Being active (maybe...)

Blog 14: Third Interview Preperation

Interviews

What is the best possible way to preserve and protect our water and ecosystems?

1. Who do you plan to interview? What is this persons area of expertise? 

I plan on interviewing my current mentor, Joe Rosales. My mentor works in the storm water department at Montclair city hall. 

2. Verify that you have called your interviewee to schedule an interview. What is the date and time of the interview?

3. Phrase an open-ended question that will help you find research resources that would help you answer the EQ. 

Do you know of any books or websites that I can help use to find an answer to my EQ?

4. Phrase an open-ended question that will help you think about other useful activities you might do to help you answer the EQ.

Do you know of any other people or places where I can go to get information about my topic?

5. Phrase two open-ended questions that will help you to understand your interviewees perspective on an aspect of your EQ.

How important do you think the topic of water conservation is and why?

How soon do you think we need to make a change in the way we use and treat water in order to save it?

Blog 13: Hour Mentorship Check-In

10 hour mentorship check in

1. Where are you doing your mentorship?

I'm doing my mentorship at the storm water division of Montclair city hall.

2. Who is your contact? What make this person an expert?

My mentor is Joe Rosales. He works in the Storm water section and has been working there for many years. He knows a lot bout my topic and has taught me many things while I've been working with him.

3. How many hours have you done during the school year?

During the school year I have done 29 hours.

4. Succinctly, summarize what you did, how well you and your mentor worked together, and how you plan to complete the remaining hours.

During my mentorship hours I have done many things, including help run a booth during a water conservation fair, shadow during restaurant inspections, and helped start new projects to inform the public about water conservation. Me and my mentor have worked pretty well together, and I enjoy working with him. He has taught me a lot about water conservation. I plan to complete the remaining hours by continuing to work with him and complete the tasks he gives me, and to hopefully further help with public awareness projects.

Blog 12: Holiday Project Update

Research

1. What did you do over break with your senior project?

Over break I found many new article about my topic, and started working on my independent component.

2. What was the most important thing you learned from what you did and why? What was the source of what you learned? 

I learned more about the walker basin project, mainly from newspaper articles. I also learned a bit about how many animals are affected by waste in the ocean, which I found out through my own research on my independent component.

3. Your third interview will be a ten question interview related to possible answers for your EQ. Who will you talk to and why?

I will probably talk to my mentor since he know a lot about my topic and the details of the senior project.