This week, I met with Mr. Mario Magaña Álvarez, an Outreach Specialist for 4-H Youth Development, for an informational interview about his work helping students from underserved and underrepresented communities. I also continued working on finishing up my drone dance lesson plan, translating the student packet into Spanish, and beginning to work on the PowerPoint presentation that goes with the lesson plan.
MEETING WITH MARIO MAGAÑA ÁLVAREZ
This week, I was very lucky to be able to meet with Mr. Mario Magaña Álvarez. He works with the 4-H Youth Development Program, which is a network of educators and volunteers that help youth develop professional skills while learning about various career pathways. The main way that this program supports this is by providing students with valuable hands-on experiences through experiential learning. I found out that he works as an outreach specialist to recruit students to participate in the program, as well as volunteers to help run the program. I asked about what kinds of work volunteers can help with, and he told me that volunteers are welcomed throughout the year to help out with the different programs and activities, as well as to help with camps that are held during the summer.
It was really great to hear about the amazing work that Mr. Magaña does with 4-H. I was really glad for the opportunity to get to meet with him and learn more about what 4-H does.
continuing to work on my lesson plan
I also continued to work on my lesson plan this week. I looked at the Oregon Visual Arts Education Standards and added the standards covered by the curriculum into the lesson plan so that teachers who use the curriculum can use it to teach about computer science and/or visual arts. I also finished adding the additional instruction notes for teachers to the teacher version of the student packet included in the lesson plan. After completing this, I now have a finished version of the lesson plan in English. I also began working on creating the PowerPoint presentation that complements the lesson plans.
In addition to doing this, I also translated the student packet into Spanish so that it can be accessible to a wider range of students. I eventually hope to create a version of the PowerPoint presentation that is in Spanish as well.
However, since I now have a finished version of the lesson plan, I would like to get feedback on ways that I can still improve it before it gets used for a workshop.
goals for next week
Next week, I would like to reach out to Dr. Adam Talamantes from the Office of Precollege Programs at OSU to see if I can talk to him about my lesson plan. Dr. Talamantes is a Program Coordinator for the Science and Math Investigative Learning Experience (SMILE) program, which provides underprivileged and underrepresented students gain STEM skills through afterschool science, math, and engineering programs. I think it would be really valuable to review my lesson plan with him and to hear about some of his experiences working as a Program Coordinator for SMILE. I would also like to talk with my mentor again about the progress that I have made on the lesson plan.
In addition to this, I would also like to continue working on the PowerPoint presentation to go with the lesson plan. I plan on contacting Dr. Cythia Reséndiz, and Oregon Coast STEM Hub Director for Oregon State University, to see if there is anything that I can do to help out with the planning of an in-person workshop using this lesson plan that will happen around April or May 2022.
Finally, I would also like to register for the Celebrating Undergraduate Excellence (CUE) Showcase in May 2022 to present the work that I have been doing as a part of URSA Engage.
