Blog 11: Lesson 1 Reflection

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

I am most proud that I was able to have fun and be excited about the presentation. I noticed that some people were excited, but they carried themselves as if they weren't that excited because of their tone of voice and volume.

2. What assessment would you give yourself on your lesson? Explain why you earned that grade using evidence from the component contract.

I give myself an AP. I give myself an AP because I was not calm and my voice was very shaky and seemed to be visibly nervous. I do hope I did receive a P though, but would understand if I did not receive an AP.

3. If you could go back, what would you change about your lesson?  How can you use that knowledge to give a better Lesson 2?

If I could change my lesson 1, I would have practiced the presentation out loud and not just in my head. To do better for Lesson 2, I would make sure my presentation is ready a few days before my actual presentation and practice it with a few people so that I don't sound so unprepared and nervous.

Blog 10 - Interview 2 Reflection

1. Please explain how you are spending your mentorship time (Is it at a workplace or somewhere else?  Are you shadowing?  Are you able to do tasks that are meaningfully related to the topic?  If so, what?  Are there other people who are experts in the location?  Etc...)

For my mentorship, I attend the Family history center on Grand, north of the 10 freeway and south of Rowland. While at my mentorship, I do research on my personal family history. The tasks I do complete are meaningful to my topic because the idea of family history is tracking down said persons personal bloodline. There are other people that can help me. I know where to find these people because I already know many of the people that work with it on a regular basis.

2.  How did you find your mentor?  How did you convince this person to help you?

I found my mentor because I regularly attend church on Sunday with my mentor. I was able to convince my mentor in a simple manor because I know she is passionate about family history and she was excited to see that someone wanted to work with her on it.

3. How would you rate your comfort level with your mentor at this point in your relationship?  How does this relate to the time you've spent so far at mentorship/with this person

I have gotten a lot more comfortable with my mentor and this relates to the time I have spent with them for mentorship because before I found this person very odd and not very exciting, but the time I spent with my mentor, I have gotten close and have discovered they are a truly nice person, but are just socially awkward in a sense.

4. What went well in this interview?  Why do you think so?  What do you still need to improve?  How do you know?  How will you go about it?

With my interview, things went well because once I got to my third question about finding missing information such as census', birth certificates, death certificates, and marriage licenses that's when the interview truly took shape and became more than a get to know you interview. I think it went well because my third question was a lot more than just tell me about yourself and about their experience. I need to improve my questions because until I changed my third question, all five of my questions were about my interviewee and not really about their experience. I will ask for help from the senior team because even though no one else is doing my topic, the senior team could still possibly point me in the right direction.

Blog #3 Interview Prep

1.  Who do you plan to interview?  Why?

I plan to interview my mentor because I don't know who else to talk to about family history and where else I could go for advice and for places to go for more research.

2.  Five questions will be assigned to all seniors to ask.  What additional questions do you plan to ask?  Ask open-ended questions.  What are open-ended questions? Click here! 

I plan on asking my mentor on why family history has exploded and why everyone wants to do it so suddenly. I also plan on asking for books to recommendations for research. 

Blog 9 - Advisory Prep 3

How I feel about not having had met my family :/



1. State whether or not you currently have a mentor, and what the status of your interview is with that person (I have completed the interview, I have scheduled the interview, I have not scheduled the interview, etc).

I do have a mentor, and I am currently waiting to hear back from my mentor to see when she could meet. Most likely, my interview will be this Sunday because it seems to work best for her and me.

2. At this point, your research is probably guiding your studies toward more specific areas within your topic.  Name the area or two you find most promising and explain your reasons.   

I have noticed during my mentor ship and during my research, that I am facing the dilemma of not having certain records for unknown reasons. For example, when I try to do my research for Europe, that those records are not there. I plan on doing research to determine why those records are not there.

3. What kinds of sources do you think will help you in the next month to gain more research depth?  Where will you go to get them?

I would like to get history books because I would love to learn where everything has gone and why it isn't there anymore. I will look these books up on Amazon and see if I could get them for a decent price. I will also look at the Cal Poly library because they have a lot of sources. I will also talk to my mother about getting the sources for me since I am not on the list to check out a book from the library at Cal Poly.

4. Write down a possible EQ.  Please don't worry about wording other than ensuring that it provides the option for multiple correct answers.  At this point, the senior team is most interested in understanding your thought process. 

A possible EQ I have is, "What is the best way to obtain  the sources I need when they are non-existent?"

Blog 8: Independent Component 1 Proposal

1.  Describe in detail what you plan to do for your 30 hours.

I don't know what I want to do. I am stuck between completing more mentor ship hours. I was also thinking of doing a pedigree for my family. 

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

I will interview members of my family about what they their genetic features.

3.  Explain how what you will be doing will help you explore your topic in more depth.

This will help me with my topic because I am doing genealogy as well and not just Family History.

4.  Update your Senior Project Hours log

After I finish doing hours for the day, I will record them to keep track of what I do. And how many hours go into it.

Blog 7- Second Interview Questions

1.  Who is your mentor and where do they work?  If their workplace does not reflect their expertise, what makes them an expert?

My mentor is Sherrie Salmons and she is currently retired, though she does volunteer at the Family History Center on Grand. She also practices Family History on her spare time.

2.  What five questions will you ask them about their background?

Questions I would ask her are:

Why did you start Family History?

How long have you been participating in Family History?

What's something significant you have learned about yourself completing Family History?

Has your relationship with your family changed in any way ever since you started Family History?

What's your favorite part of Family History?

Blog 6: House Advisory House

1. What has worked well for you concerning senior project this year?  What has made it a positive experience for you?

The experience is making me excited to learn more about history and about my family and ways to help others learn of their family. This has been a positive experience has been positive because I don't know if I will get bored of my project and want to quit doing it.

2. What are you finding difficult concerning senior project?  How can you adapt to make that portion work better for you?  How might the senior team help?

I am finding it hard to find a way to get to my mentor ship hours, because there is no direct way to get to my area. I am looking up bus lines that go near my mentor ship so that I can make it to my hours, because no one is able to take me to my hours. There is no way for the senior team to help me because this is an issue of getting from point A to point B. I could talk to my mentor though about coming to my house and doing mentorship with me.

Blog 4: House Advisory House

What I hope to accomplish from my senior project is to learn more about my family and to be able to help others be able to learn about their family. Through the senior topic, I hope to learn techniques that will help me be able to kick through the "brick wall" that blocks my path from learning about my family.

Blog 2- Summer Mentorship

The Covina Family History Center is where I completed my ten hours this summer and where I am going to be completing my hours throughout the school year.

This is my mentor Sherri Salmans. She does Family History for herself and volunteers for the Mormon church and helps anyone who needs help.

1. List the Sherri Salmans, (626) 589-6236, and Family History Center of the Church of Jesus Christ and Latter Day Saints.

2. Sherrie Salmons has been involved with Family History for over 10 years and has uncovered most of her        personal Family History. She is also a recognized expert in the LDS church.

3. List three questions for further exploration now that you've completed your summer hours.

• Why is it important to learn about my family history?
• What is the best method to finding your family when they are not recorded anywhere in history?
• What do you do when you feel you're at a dead end in researching your family?

4. The most important thing I have gained from this experience so far is the knowledge of my heritage and knowing where my family came from and how my family came from their native countries to start a new life here in the United States.

5. My Senior Topic is going to be Family History/ Genealogy. I have decided that I want to continue doing this for my official senior topic because throughout the summer I have learned so much about my family in only 10 hours and cannot imagine what I could learn in 50 hours.

Blog 1 – Senior Final Lesson/Interview Reflection

1.  What three lessons were most helpful for you to see, and why?

• One important lesson I attended was the lesson on Network Marketing because the activity was confusing and it made no sense. And I took a note down saying that if I were to do a similar activity, I would have to explain the activity more in depth.
• From my Automotive lesson, I learned that it is okay to have some fun with the presentation. Not to much so that you aren't taken seriously, but enough to make it somewhat entertaining. It was important for me to learn that because I don't want the students who watch my presentation bored out of their brains.
• For Labor and Delivery I learned the lesson of making every actually get up and do the activity because some of my other presentations had activities that were only able to have a couple people participate, and that was not very exciting to watch.

2. List one thing that you learned about the senior project in interviews that will help you get off to a good start?

• I was absent for the interviews.

3. What topic(s) are you considering, and why?

• Social working of some kind because it is what I want to do for a possible career.
• I would also want to do some kind of psychology because I have always been intrigued by that field of mental health and study of human mind.

4. What EQ do you think might be interesting to consider in guiding a project like this? (Please don't worry about any sort of formula...we want this question to come from your genuine interest).

• What is the most effective way to help a distressed teen that comes from an "easy" life?

5. What are some ideas you have about finding summer mentorship?

• I am going to talk to some of my personal friends about the project and about the mentor ship and hope they can point me somewhere for a start.