It's All Fun From Here!

This week has to be the toughest and sleepless week of senior year. We had two major papers due today. Econ and Senior project. I finally finished my research paper! This is very exciting! I also have learned a lot from my findings. Knowing that my paper is finished I no longer have to worry about working on it. From this point on all I have to do is set up all my dates for my CPR classes. Teach and enjoy the fun of teaching students how to save a life. I am ready and pumped for these classes!

Dates

During Thanksgiving week I talked to Ms. Gilespie and Ms. Howard and I was able to set up dates to teach the rest of their classes CPR. I will be teaching their classes after Christmas break. I will be teaching Ms. Howards classes January the 5th-7th and then Monday the 10th. I have talked about just taking one day to teach CPR class to all of Ms. Howards class. We will see if it is possible. I can't wait to teach them!

Around and about

Not only has my senior project let me teach to Oakbrook students, but teaching CPR has spread outside of school as well. Tonight at my church's youth club, called the Pathfinders, I was asked by the director if I could teach CPR to the kids ages 10 through 12. Mr. Alan, the director of the Spartanburg Pathfinder club, heard that I was teaching CPR at Oakbrook and he decide that it would be good for the Pathfinders to learn CPR. I taught the CPR class everything went very well! I was not as nervous this time because I know most of the kids in Pathfinders. I had a really fun time teaching them! It always brings a smile on my face when I see the younger children so eager to learn and have fun learning CPR! The kids where a little loud at sometimes. I had to quite them down every now and then, but it was not too bad. I had 10 kids that learned how to save a live! While I was teaching Nick Dawson took pictures for me. Once again I feel so happy that I taught kids how to save a life and I have gained more experience on how to teach my CPR classes at Oakbrook.

   

As far as scheduling my CPR classes at school I am still planning with Ms. Gillespie and Ms. Howard when I can be able to teach again in their classes. I have planned with them to also teach their classes now and when the new semister starts. I am setting up dates with other teachers so that I can go ahead and plan for the rest of my CPR classes. So far my next CPR class will be sometime after Thanksgiving break.

Planning week

      This week was a calm week. I did not have any research paper to stress over, but by next week we should be revising our paper. I also did not teach any CPR classes this week. Ms. Gillespie and Ms. Howard are setting up some possible dates that I can teach. My next CPR classes should be this coming week. I just have to confirm the dates. The leader of my church's Pathfinder group wants me to teach our Pathfinder group. So I will be teaching them sometime this month. This should give me even more practice and even more confidence to teach the students. I can not wait to start teaching the CPR classes for both my school and church's youth! I never thought that teaching CPR at my school would give me the opportunity not to just teach at my school, but also to my church's youth!

The Update; Reasearch draft done and CPR volunteer

This week I finished my rough draft of my research paper. It is so relieving that I have my rough draft done! All that is left is revising and my final paper. I have learned a lot more about AEDs, CPR, and more about cardiovascular diseases in my research. This information helps me gain a better understating on AED's and cardiovascular diseases that I did not know before. I also learned that there is a distinguish between Sudden cardiovascular diseases,

Last week I volunteer to teach  CPR classes at Converse college for an annual girls day event. The girls were from different schools, they were 16-14 years old. I was not the lead instructor, but I had a fun time and enjoyed teaching CPR to the girls. I observed how the CPR classes were ran. After I volunteered it gave me a good idea on how I can teach my CPR classes. It also made me more comfortable teaching CPR  classes to the children. It was a Very fun experience which will help me a lot in teaching my own CPR classes.

Here are some pictures form the CPR classes at Converse college:

The Update; CPR class take two

Yesterday I taught my second CPR class. The class that I taught was Ms. Gillespies PE class. I had 12 students in my CPR class. I had two instructors who assisted with the class.After I teach my classes I give each student a little red CPR saves lives with a little book let with the steps to CPR in it.  I am becoming more comfortable teaching the CPR classes to the students. I am also really excited that the kids, to my surprise, are very excited and interested in learning CPR. Today one of the students I taught in my first class came up to me and said to me,along the lines of " I'm glad you taught me how to do CPR because now I'll be ready if I need to save someones life!". That just made me so happy and even more excited that there are students that are real interested and excited! Another thing that made me really excited is that Ms. Gillespie wants me to teach all of her PE classes, since we are beginning a new term. She told me that she thinks that it is very helpful and that she wants all of the PE students to be able to know how to do CPR. That just makes me so happy! I hope that I can be able to teach all of them! I'm so excited!

     

         I did not post my thesis sentence in my last blog so this is it:

" Today not all public places have an Automated External Defibrillator (AED). By teaching CPR classes, telling success stories and utilizing media advocacy, an increased awareness of AED's can result in AED's can be placed in more public facilities thus helping reduce death due to sudden cardiac arrest."

My English teacher has helped my revise my thesis so this thesis I am going to change the wording of it this weekend, but this is the jest of it.

       

      On our "three day weekend" I will be helping volunteer with CPR classes being taught at Converse College. This will be on  Friday October 22 and the CPR classes will start at 9:15 AM and end at 3:00 PM. We are expecting around 200 girls or more, 6 – 14 yrs. old. I think this will also help me become more comfortable teaching. I will not be a main instructor, but I think that with me volunteering it will help me gain more experience in how I should teach my class. Volunteering will also help me to become much more comfortable talking and teaching to kids and this will be VERY helpful for my CPR classes. I can not wait! I am excited and nervous at the same time! Till next time!

CPR saves lives!

First CPR class

Today I had my very first CPR class for my senior project! It was Ms. Howard's 8th and 9th grade dance class.At first I was a little bit nervous making sure that I had everything. Before my class started I was so frantic, making sure that I had all of the papers that everyone needed to fill out and I had to make sure that my volunteers would show up and not become lost. My two volunteers came and helped me. As we were setting our equipment up the kids started coming in and I was very surprised at how eager some of them were to learn CPR. One kid said along the lines of " Yeah! Lets get ready to learn CPR and learn how to save a life!". That made me less nervous and more excited. The kids were very good and cooperative and very good for my first class. Some of the kids would keep talking when we were explaining some things, but thank goodness that Ms. Howard was there to quite them down. To keep track of who I taught I let each student sign a roster to show that they took the class. The American Heart Association has a evaluation from that you give. So I gave the evaluation paper to Ms. Howard to see comment on how I did. Today was a good first start to my CPR classes. I wasn't able to take any pictures of my CPR class today, because I forgot my camera. The next classes that I will teach I will make sure that pictures will be taken. My next class will be October 19th with Ms. Gillespie's fitness class.
CPR saves lives.

Next week, the BIG day

On my last post I posted that I'll be starting my CPR classes this week. Well that was a mistake on my part. It will actually be next week! This week I have been preparing for my first CPR class that I will teach with the kids. I have been re watching the CPR video's that I will be showing and to make sure that I have everything ready for this coming week! Kind of nervous, but excited at the same time! It will be my first class teaching kids instead of adults. I'm so excited! My first CPR class will be Thursday October 14 with Ms. Howard's dance class. This will be during seventh period. I will be teaching seventh graders! Yay I can't wait for this week to start my CPR classes!

The Update; this week

This week we went on our Senior Retreat. It was a blast and a very much needed off time. It was a bunch of fun. So far I'm just getting ready for my first CPR class which should be next week with Ms. Howard's dance class! I'm excited. The dance class is very big so I will have to ask the company that I'm with for some help because I will not be able to teach more than 6 students by myself. That is in the process. Other wise I'm so excited for my first CPR class! Yay! Oh just to add one of the Juniors came up to me today and asked what my senior project was; and they were super excited about my project and being able to learn CPR! I think my CPR classes will be a success! Until next time!

update

This week I was able to set up my frist two CPR classes! The frist one is Thursday, October 14th which will be Ms. Howard's dance class and it will be during seventh period. My second class will be on Tuesday October 19th which is Ms. Gillespie's PE class. I have a little problem that I will have to figure out. Both classes have more than 6 students. Six students is how many students that one person can teach per class. So I'm going to go through the training center that I am affiliated in; and ask for some volunteers that will be willing to help and teach me. My paper will be on increasing awareness of AED's becuase not many people know what they do. Which causes private facilities not to install them. This comming week we'll be going on our senior retreat! Till next time

The Update; Proposal finished

This week I finished presenting my senior project idea to the board. I was very nervous at first, but after I did my presentation of what I will be teaching in my class I was no longer nervous. What I did in my presentation was explain what to do when someone is choking, I demonstrated this on Ms. Zion. Then I brought a Actar, ( CPR dummy) and showed them how to do CPR. The proposal was not what I expected. Surprisingly I had a fun time listening to the board's ideas and talking to them. The board gave me good advice on my project and my topic for my essay.Thank you very much for your helpful ideas.  The things that I needed to get done is to talk to Ms. Seay. After talking to Ms. Seay we narrowed it down to two classes that I will be teaching for now. Which is Ms. Gillespie's P.E class and Ms. Howard's dance class. Right now I am in the process of getting in touch with Ms. Gillespie's and Ms. Howard on the dates that I can teach CPR in their class. That completes my week. Untill next time!

What to do

So far I am ready as ever to teach CPR to the Oakbrook students! I just have one problem though. I am still not sure how I am going to teach these classes. My plan is to get class schedule of classes that I can teach during class periods that I would have free and teach those students in those available classes. Having ask the teachers permission to take their time one class period. Then my class mates gave me a better idea that I could ask the coaches if I could teach their teams and I could offer the classes to teacher's as well. I would get more done that way, but I alone can only teach 6 students at one time, so I would have to get help of more instructors.. I don't know whether or not I should teach the sports teams, coach's, and offer CPR classes to the teachers as well.. hmmm. Getting a little nervous about the proposal, but I'm sure I'll be fine when time comes!

The Update

So far my Senior Project is going alright. I have had alot of good comments and ideas on how I should teach the CPR classes. Which has been very helpful. I am still struggling on what direction to take with my research paper. One thing that I do need to do is schedule and confirm the dates to when I can teach the classes. So far I have talked to Ms. Seay and she said that she will get back to me as when I can teach the classes. Getting a little nurvous for my proposal.

The next step

So far my senior project is going well. I have gained more experience by doing another CPR class this week. I was sturggling on ideas on what to write my research paper on, but I did find an iteresting topic to write on now with the help of Ms. Zion's suggestions. Thank you Ms. Zion!
 My paper will be on The Good Samaratin Law and how it protects individuals who try to help people who are physically hurt. Another struggle that I have encountered is how to find the time to provide the CPR class to students who want to receive a certification card. This is the Heart Saver CPR and the use of AED class, which takes at least two hours. There is a course fee for this class and this includes the certification card. The class that I have planned to teach is basic CPR and it takes an hour and is a non certification course. Any thoughts on this?
I would like to keep my CPR classes to a maximum of six students.
Oh by the way I have chosen my mentor. She is considered one of the top notch CPR instructors.
CPR saves lives!
 More to come!

My Senior Project Idea

My Senior Project idea is to teach the Oakbrook students basic CPR. First of all, to be able to this, I'm required to be certified instructor. This summer I took an extensive two day course from the American Heart Association, and now I am certified to teach CPR. My certification is good for two years. I'm not quite sure when to teach these classes, but my  goal is to teach the students before spring. I was thinking about teaching the students after school, but my classmates suggested that I should teach it during classes. If I teach the classes during school I will first contact the teachers to let them know that I would be coming in that day to teach. That is my senior project idea. CPR saves lives.