Blog 13

What experience do you bring to your project?
Given my project is working with kids, I have a great experience with working with them since I've babysat and worked at a daycare for quite a while. In my project I work with a variety of different age groups. We make projects, we laugh, we play, and most importantly, I am helping out the community by taking care of children when family members are working.
How has the first week gone? What did you do?
It's been going good, since I'm doing part of my community service at the daycare that I work at, but not getting paid for, the kids are already comfortable with me and I work well with them. I've been helping kids at my daycare that need extra help due to behavioral issues and then playing games and doing projects with other kids. It's been going good! Since I do my project after school since that's when I originally work, during class period I am in the library working on my project.

Blog 12

My internship will be at Kindercare Learning Center in Newburyport, which is about 10 minutes from Pentucket. My plan is to go to my internship April 24-28 and May 1-5. Given it is only ten minutes away I am going to go right after fourth period - during lunch and this class to do my internship. Days I do not have work after school (Tuesdays) I will go after I get out. I plan on working with the kids, doing different projects and keeping observations of how children react to different things such as, a game that includes stressful parts. I will also observe and take notes on different development things I see. I will be away May 10-15, therefore May 8-9 I will be in the classroom working on my project.

Blog 11

Teachers ask students to do research and write about it so we can gain knowledge and expand our imagination. I know when I research I learn a ton of new information, so learning can be another factor as to why teachers would want students to research.

I found a lot of information for my paper through databases, books, and different online sources. My topic was very broad so there is a ton of information out there. It wasnt hard approaching my information.

Looking back at the last ten weeks what I learned about myself is that I need to get better at time management, especially for when I go to college. I also learned that school work and being a senior is not a good mix for me!!!

Like what I said above, I need to work on my time management in college, but what I will carry successfully into next year is my ability to communicate. I am not afraid to confront people (although sometimes I will feel annoying), I am good at communicating especially things I need help with which will help me greatly next year.

A particular week that did not work with me was the week the chapters 6 and 9 were due on google classroom, I don't know if I was having an off week or I just didn't have any motivation, but that was the only week I think I struggled the most. Otherwise I don't think this is a bad class, it's enjoyable and fun to be in. Would be more fun if I was a junior, I'd actually have more motivation.

Blog 10

Something that has frustrated me is the fact that I took a lot of time and thought into processing a letter to send to possible places to shadow. I sent out at least 6 letters and not a single person got back to me. Therefore, I had to revert to a plan B. I am going into a place this week to talk to the manager of a child department to figure out my service hours. Although I know where I am going, it took longer then it should have and I just got a little frustrated when no one was returning my emails or calls.

My biggest time waster would probably be some of the Google classroom work, sometimes it was a force to complete those. During the time of getting those done I could have been more productive in reading my book or writing my research paper.

I deal with stress by looking at the big picture. I remind myself that I am almost done with school and that if I push myself and try to avoid all the stress, it will pay off in the end. I do one thing at a time and not overwhelm myself more.

I am currently all caught up in everything. However, the past month I have been a little bit behind because of stress. I know it's no excuse but a mix of stress and the fact that senior year is almost over is not a good mix. I think when I go off to college all the stress will go away because most of my stress comes from finishing this year on a good note- trying to do that on top of working 5 days a week right after school, from working going straight to practice 3 days a week and most nights I don't get home till 9-10 and then I have no motivation to do work that late. Eventually I won't be working or doing sports anymore and my stress will decrease. I plan to get all my homework done in school the rest of the year and try my best to stay on top of things.

Blog 9

Keeping myself motivated this close to the end of high school is very hard. In my other classes what keeps me motivated is the fact that if I have above a B+ average I don't need to take that certain classes final. In this case it is different, but what motivates me is that I really want to do good in this class and that it's almost over! I am a little bit behind, but not too bad. Just been a crazy two weeks. I plan to finish the semester on top of things. I can do better, I just have to motivate myself more. I honk working with the community is awesome, it's a great way to involved and help different organizations and people. I think you asking us to make connections can help make things easier. The act of reflecting promotes learning because in order to have success everyone needs to fail at least once and when one fails, you reflect on what happened and you learned from it in order to succeed the next time. Basically you are learning from your mistakes. I've done this many many times.

The Bumpy Road to Success

1) A failure or a setback I have had so far is not submitting my work on time. This has been a crazy few months of senior year, most of the time I am on top of things that are due, but time management is a big problem that I have to fix before I get to college. It's not a matter of not wanting to do the work, I just put other things before school sometimes and that should not be the case. My goal for the rest of the school year is to submit my work on time.

2) I don't think anything has been rewarding so far, given that I haven't heard back from any of the internships I sent letters or emails too. Once I hear back and I know where I am going for my shadowing, a huge rock will be lifted off my chest and I will feel a sense of reward.

3)  The stresses I have had are the work in the google classroom and waiting to hear back from people I have reached out too. I have been reading my book which is a very good book so I am not stressed about that, just the fact that I want to do good in this class stresses me out.

Leadership

Who is the leader you most admire?

The leader I most admire is my brother.


How has this person demonstrated that she or he is an effective leader? 

In September my brother became Chief in the US Navy. He has been apart of the Navy for 10+ years and is very dedicated. Ever since I was a little kid, I always looked up to my brother. In high school, he was an honors student and was in the top 5% of his class. He went to college for Criminal Justice and four years ago he became a cop in Virginia Beach. He showed great leadership while being a cop, but recently he left his cop job to join his dream job of being in the FBI. Even in just everyday life he demonstrates leadership because he is always leading me and my sister to the best. Everyone he works with thinks of him as a leader as well.

What qualities does he or she have that you think contribute to his or her being an effective leader? 

Determination
Dedication
Never giving up
Intelligence
Taking risks/challenges
Kindness

My brother, Blake is on the right.

Getting Back into the swing of things

1) Examine how you approach searching for a topic.   
How I approached searching for a topic is going onto the prsd website and searching for my topic in the databases. I searched Child Life Services and a lot of articles came up that were very interesting.

2) Provide at least TWO tips for others searching for articles.
Search around for different articles and skim through them before picking them because you may come across better articles.

Use different websites or databases, don't just get articles from the same place. You want information from different places that you could eventually compare or contrast.

3) Be honest, what do you think of annotated bibliographies?  
I don't think anything bad of them personally, I think they help get an idea of what the article is about.   It can get annoying eventually if there are a lot of articles one is citing.

4) What was the most productive day this week, and why?
The most productive day this week was gathering my articles and writing my annotated bibliography. I feel like I worked the most those two days, and was very focused.

5) What was the least productive day this week, and why? 
There was one day where I was not productive when I should have been. I believe it was Tuesday and then Wednesday and Thursday I got myself together and became productive. 

The Juggling Act

I am doing great with reading my nonfiction book and I am going to be reading a lot this weekend! I have also collected a few articles that go great with my topic. Recently, I have also sent out a few letters to different hospitals with Child Life Services departments (mostly Boston) in hope that they will answer soon. Below are pictures of what my letter looked like.

Something I need to get better at are my time management skills. Given I was very sick during school vacation I need to make sure to stay on top of things. I also need to figure out what I for sure want to do for  my project. 

Resume and Nonfiction book

It is very important to have a good resume, and some people may not know that. Depending on how an individual represents their resume, depends on what they want their first impression to be like. Resumes can me important for both colleges or employment. Having a good resume could make or break getting the employer's attention. My mom told me a resume is another way of showing yourself off and showing off your accomplishments. Personally it was not hard to write mine, given I am proud of what I have done of the past few years. Nothing was perfect, but it is important to be proud of what you are writing.

For my nonfiction reading book, I am reading The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls. I decided to read this book because I received many good reviews towards this book and it fits my topic of Child Life Services. I haven't really dug into the book yet given I have only read a few chapters. It seems interesting so I am excited to read it. 

Skills for this course

Skills I have: 

• Independence 
• Flexible
• Detail oriented 
• Analyzing problems
• Determination
• Goal setting
• Responsibility 
• Self-motivation
• Organization

Skills I need:

• Meeting deadlines
• Time management 
• Confronting others
• Maintaining emotional control under stress
• Decision making
• Public speaking
• Maintaining focus with interruptions 

Skills I may able to improve 

• Conflict Resolution
• Patience
• Developing Plans
• Time management (I can improve)

Given the name of this course, "Experiential Leadership" it involves an immense amount of leadership. Leadership to me is taking action and being independent. I have a tough topic that many people probably would not be able to pursue in, however with the skills I already have and the dedication I have towards this topic, I feel as though I am going to be very successful with this course. I have a lot of skills I can improve on and new skills to gain and since I am very good at goal setting, my goal for the semester is to gain more skills, learn more about my topic, and just have fun! Not everybody gets a chance to do this in high school. If I take it step by step I will be great. 

Inviting others to view my blog

I shared my blog with my friends on Facebook!

Library Card Experience

This weekend I actually found out that I have my own library card already! I was all ready to go this weekend and get a library card when my mom said to me, "Julia, you already have a library card!" Throughout high school I have gone to the Merrimac Public library more than someone could expect of me. Sometimes I have found myself at the library doing a project if it is too loud in my house, or if my printer ran out of ink at my house so I had to stop by the library and use theirs. I have even taken out books this past year for different classes, so I am very familiar with this library. I've had my own library card for a while because when I was younger I would always go to the library with my mom and we would pick out books to read. When I had a class last semester that involved getting books was when my mom renewed my card.

Introduction

The name is Julia Miller, not Emily Miller as many teachers can not tell my sister and I apart. I am seventeen years old and I have three siblings. Since freshman year I have babysat a little boy named Paulden. I started babysitting him when he was just 8 months old and now he is four. Most people can say I had a huge impact in his life. End of Junior year, I started working at a daycare

called Koinonia. Koinonia Preschool Daycare is an outreach and support ministry of the West Newbury Congregational Church. Through this daycare we seek to respond to the concerns of working families, and provide support to parents in the care and nurturing their children. Since the daycare is apart of the Congregational Church, our vision is that children will be instilled at an early age with the desire to do what is right and good as taught in the word of God, as that is a result of this positive influence, the children, their families, and the community will benefit today and future generations to come. Since I started working at this daycare, I never thought a job could be so fun. I grew many amazing relationships with the children and their families and each day I am thankful I get to help families that trust me in helping raise and guide their child. Given I love working with children, it is something that I am passionate about.

    For the leadership project, Erin Mikson and I  have decided to be partners given we are both interested in the health care industry. We are going to be focusing more on the Child Life Services Departments in local hospitals. In this department, you provide psychological support to the child and their family due to some traumatic effect. The goal of this profession is to help the family cope more effectively. We plan on shadowing different hospitals with a Child Life Services Department and learning more about different problems children have.