Self Reflection Guiding Questions

Are you satisfied with your learning?
• Are you satisfied that you demonstrated your knowledge and skill?
• How does your work compare to the expectations on the rubric?
• With which parts of the assignment (project, performance, etc.) were you most satisfied?
• How closely does your work on this assignment (project, performance, etc.) reflect your learning?
• Why do you think this assignment worked for you?
• Were there any parts that didn’t work?
• How did you do the assignment/project? Be specific.
• Were the strategies that you used effective in helping you reach your goals? o What learning strategies were helpful? Explain. o What would you have to add to learn more, do better, etc.?
• On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate your effort?
• Did the amount of time, effort and strategies used help you reach your goal?
 • If you were to do this over, how could it be improved?
• As a teacher, what can I do to help you?
• What can I do to increase the value of this assignment/project, etc.?

Mental Health Unit: Reflection

According to Mentalhealth.gov “Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act. It also helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make choices. Mental health is important at every stage of life, from childhood and adolescence through adulthood.” No matter your age, race, gender, or walk of life, we are all susceptible to poor mental at some point. Throughout our Mental Health unit in NEW School I learned the importance of awareness and the right to make mistakes by analyzing Shakespearean characters, producing a video about anxiety, and running an inconclusive forensic DNA lab.

Romeo Character analysis essay

We began this unit by acting out the play Romeo and Juliet and later had to write an analytical essay diving deeper into the mental state of our chosen character. I chose Romeo and took a closer look at his depression and how it seemed to repress and worsen after certain occurrences. I had to look at quotes im the play and really dissect their meaning. While some quotes undoubtedly revealed his sorrow, it was the implicit factors that had caused his depression, including childhood neglect. It took research to figure out this cause because I had to learn that during Shakespeare’s time, parents did not normally care for their children and that childhood neglect can cause depression. We began with the upbeat reenactment of the play and proceeded to look further into the reasons behind the mental health of some of the characters. I really enjoyed learning more about causes of poor mental health and how they can be avoided through story analysis.

Anxiety-Youtube

My favorite project during this unit was our “unit project” where we had the freedom to explore and create some form of media that displayed our chosen mental health. My partener and I decided to spread awareness about anxiety because we both knew multiple people that currently experience it. We created a video that included strong visuals and voiceovers of the people we interviewed. Once we found 5 people willing to be interviewed we came up with questions and and rules for interviewing. This included questions about their experiences and feelings. We wanted to respect their privacy and make sure they felt comfortable so we made agreements such as “you don not have to answer any questions you do not feel comfortable answering” and “we will only record your voice if that is what you are comfortable with”. I found it very interesting learning more about anxiety and how it affects my peers. I was very proud of our work and I hope that the more people that see our video, the more awareness we will spread about anxiety.

Continually,I learned that it is okay to make mistakes while exploring science. I struggle with accepting my mistakes as well as other, however this unit has taught me that being able to accept mistakes is a key component to maintaining strong mental health. Each group (there were 8 groups in which you were assigned to be with) in our class ran their own forensics DNA testing lab. We learned how to make gel boxes, extract DNA, and run it. Unfortunately our lab was inconclusive because we make quite a few mistakes such as using steel that was not stainless which  rusted the entire box making our results unclear. We also left our comb in the gel box too long and did a poor job extracting the DNA from the test tubes. While this lab was fun to run and educational, the results were very disappointing. I have come to accept the fact that labs will not always go correctly, especially complicated, expensive ones. It is important to keep an open mind about all aspects of life even when things do not go as you planned. This lab taught me to be careful when performing labs, you can always learn something no matter the outcome, and that mistakes are a part of life.

All in all, mental health is a complex, serious topic and at the end of the day, the topic needs to be treated with care. I have learned to keep in mind that anyone can experience mental health at any point in their life and that they may be fragile. If you know anyone who experiences poor mental health, or if you simply do not know much about it I challenge you to learn more about the issue so you can help anyone who might be going through a hard time.

     Should we be cutting calories out? Is it the sugar that is making us fat? Are carbs bad for me? As Americans we face these questions daily because our eating habits are defined by current health trends and health specialist recommendations. We usually succumb to these ideas that change every few years, but how are we to really know what is the best for us? I have had to take a step back and really look at the importance of what I eat after learning that even local supermarkets care more about their profit than the community, and all we see is today is "mass production" rather than "quality production", and the fact that food really does have long term affects on our bodies.

     I remember going to the grocery store as a little girl and getting a sticker from the cashier at Raley's in my small town, Windsor, CA, but know I understand these grocery stores for what they are -a large corporation that wants be to buy more so they can earn more. While a few of the cashiers at my town's Raley's know who my mom is, it is not the people that work there, but the people who run it. I recently learned that the grocery store layout has a whole lot more to do with their profit than you would think. For example, they place dairy and produce at the back, so you have to walk through multiple isles to get there, which would make you more likely to buy more. Additionally, they put their floral section at the front, right as you walk in, to seem ore appealing. Since we do not think about what we eat, or where it comes from, we find ourselves falling under the pressure of purchase that these grocery stores have mastered.

     After interviewing local growers who sell to their community at the Farmer's Market every week, I got some insight to what it means to grow and sell local, as well as mass production versus quality production. All these growers have small farms in which they grow a small amount of crops and animals. This is compared to large, industrialized farms like General mills who have hundreds of cows inside a small barn where they are force to eat corn, which their system is not used to. This tends to make cows sick, and it spreads easily inside their small living quarters. In order to combat this, the cows are fed hormones for the few weeks they are alive, which is as long as it takes them to reach a certain weight. I know that I do not wan to eat animals that were treated cruelly and who's on;y purpose was to be fattened as quickly as possible. We owe it to local farmers to purchase and use their products that are grown more like they are supposed to, that is to say, like in nature.

The fact that what we eat helps our body remain healthy makes the idea of certain foods, amusing. Some families live off of fast food, because it is a fast, cheap option, however, it is incredibly harmful for our bodies. In order for our bodies to function properly, we need all sorts of foods; carbs, glucose, protein, ect, but with all the processing of food nowadays, we are taking out all the nutritional value of foods, and they simply pass through our body without leaving a trace. We do not benefit from this, therefore it should not be a form of eating. Just as the picture below shows, our bodies produce waste products after taking nutrients out of the food we eat, but the fact that in the processing, or pulling apart of food, we are taking out essential components in our diet. We should be returning to the idea of eating whole, foods.

     What should we be eating? We may never know the true answer, however, we can do our part to continue to help our local economy by buying from local farmers, improve our own health by eating more nutrient rich foods, and focusing on quality food rather than quick food