Reflection #1
So far the articles we have found are about how people react or feel about themselves when they are told mean things and when they are told positive things about them. They connect to our universal theme, change, because throughout the time they change from one thing to another just for the things that are said to or about them that may impact them negatively or positively. The two generalizations they connect to are generates additional change and can be either positive or negative. In our exploration through our topic a new things I learned was that most people have a low self esteem and a bad self image of themselves. We have not changed our topic or universal theme and generalizations. We believe that if we stick to what we first came up with we would do great and the things we end up finding will be helpful with our own self-image. I real hope to find the positive outcomes about self-image so that we can have an amazing twist in our project. When you normally hear about self-esteem and self-image you are being told the negative part about dealing with this part of life. We want to talk about the opposing side which is the positive side, although it may be harder to find research for, I know we can keep persisting until we find enough information. I believe that me and my partener are working very well together because I know that with my partner we can get a ton of work done without goofing off too much. Also, I believe we make a great team because we both know how to find credible and reliable sources. One thing I would say we need to work on is deciding which mentor we will be working with because we both want to work with our teachers but they are different and we can’t report to both mentors at the same time.
Reflection #2
Our topic and driving question have changed about 3 times since the last time I wrote a reflection. We changed our topic because self-esteem was to well know and the second time we changed was because we wanted the driving question to go more in depth with our topic. For our student-led research is interview of an expert. It was the best choice for our subject because this expert has done research in GMO and could help us with scientific studies. The easiest part of this process is choosing a gate icon and universal theme. But the hardest part is finding new credible article that go along with what our driving question is, because we have to annotate all of the 7 articles and they are really long. In order for us to successfully complete this component of the project we need to make a confirmation on when we will meet able to interview this expert. We still need to finish finding more articles and annotate them so we can put all the information together for our ISD. Me and my partner, Andrea have been working hard together but some of our articles do not go so well with our driving question. What is not working so well is our communication during class because we have different teachers during different periods, so me and my partner try to meet after school as many times as we can.
Reflection #3
From the last time I wrote about my research I learned a lot more about our topic, such as how companies are selling really unhealthy foods just to gain more money. What I learned about myself is that if I push myself hard enough I can get lots of work done in a short amount of time. My group and I want to make sure that the construction paper matches with the farm and the menu. For our supplemental piece we are planning to get 3 empty bads of sugar to represent how much sugar is added into foods. We will also put money in one bag, fats in another, and prescription bottles in the last. This will be representing what can cause putting too much sugar into food from different perspectives. We need to find the bags of sugar and the supplies to put it in. The hardest part about finding our supplies is the prescription bottles. Our group has been working very good so far but sometimes it can be hard to get all of us using our time wisely. The generalizations in the ISD were the hardest part because we couldn’t get the information in the right spot and we kept messing up the quote drop.
Reflection #4
Today is one day after our symposium presentation, it was a really great experience. Our driving question was: How Do Conflicts Within the Economic Systems of the Food Industry Contribute to Declining Health in America? Some of the revisions we made to our project before we turned it in was making sure that all the corners were sticked on to the board nicely. Before I ever did research on this topic I never knew that some companies stored food and sold it months later just for profit. I learned that through scholarly research I can find true textual evidence that I can use to support my thesis. Through my interactive piece I learned that there is tons of fat stored in our stomachs when we eat too much junk foods. On my collaborative part I think I work pretty well with one of my partners, but not so much with the other one. The only thing I would do different is pick another person to do research on because the person we interview told us all about what we already knew and not much more. Some advice I would give to incoming Symposium students is to use your time wisely and try not to stress much about it, because when it comes to presentation day it’s actually really fun. At least it was for me.