The topic I worked on was about antibiotic resistant bacteria, and their prevalence in the soil. For this research, we took samples from high school students, as well as our own samples, of soil. We then diluted these samples and observed different reactions to antibiotic over time. By using different amounts of antibiotic for different dilutions, we were able to get data about just how prevalent antibiotic resistance is in our every-day environment. We then went to Clarke Central High School and repeated the experiment with high-school students. In the future, I would like to learn even more about antibiotic resistance, because I believe that this will become a much larger issue that we will have to face as it will become more common problem as we continue to use antibiotics to treat illnesses. To understand more about this topic of research, we studied in class about antibiotics. We learned the processes by which resistant strains can overcome their environment to repopulate with more adapt versions of bacteria. We learned that in the future, the overuse and misuse of antibiotics will lead to bacterial infections becoming much harder to treat, which will result in serious problems for people, including higher rates of death. By presenting this topic to high schoolers, I believe that I was better able to grasp the topic. By helping teach others, I was able to reinforce the information for myself. I was able to use stimulating information as evidence to show the high school students that what they were learning about was something that they could observe, instead of just reading about or learning in a lecture. They used tangible data that they gathered themselves, which was a benefit to learning. This issue is relevant to the audience, and we demonstrated this by showing results happening in their own yards. This issue will be relevant for their generation, because as time goes on, more and more antibacterial resistant strains will be present. As far as creativity goes, we tried to use different techniques of letting them learn for themselves with our guidance. We allowed them to enter all of their own data, while also setting up separate stations, to which we taught different aspect of the lesson. I discovered through this project about my own capabilities to help others learn. I hadn’t considered myself a good tutor before then, but I felt like I was truly able to help these students understand the concepts. I also learned that the students themselves were truly interested in what we had to say, and they took pride in finding results from their own projects. In high school, I wouldn’t have imagined being very involved in any sort of research with a larger university, but I was glad to see these students seemed like they actually cared. Upon entering the classroom, I immediately recognized that these high school students were rowdy, since I believe they were mostly sophomores. When I saw this I knew we needed to make our lesson as interesting and attention-grabbing as possible. By splitting the class into groups, we were able to get all the students involved in learning about the topic. This adaptation helped me learn that before presenting in any situation, you need to read your audience, and make adjustments to how you speak and how you discuss the lesson. I believe that I may want a future in pharmacy, and I hope that when I give future presentations on seemingly “boring” subjects, I will be able to take what I’ve learned from this experience and apply adaptations to how I present. If I could do anything differently, I would perhaps have a closing summary of what we had done, but the class did not last long enough for us to do that, or I would have tried to maybe rotate stations. By doing this project with the high-schoolers I was able to learn more about how much bacteria becomes resistant even when high doses of antibiotic are applied. By analyzing the audience, we had to come up with creative methods of teaching, which only helped me understand our topic of presentation better. With their reactions and feedback, we could incorporate better use of language in our presentations, which I believe will help tremendously with future lessons. From this lesson, I will be able to better my own future presentations to allow me to get my points across to the audience in the best ways possible. Hopefully, I didn’t come across to distant, because I really wanted to be as welcoming to the students as possible. It is easier to communicate to people who are comfortable with you, and this is exactly what I was trying to achieve. In the future, I could work on being more present in these situations, and being more willing to serve as a helping hand, rather than just someone who studied the subject before they did. This assignment was effective in addressing a real world issue, because antibiotic resistance is something we should all be made more aware of. Feedback from the students helped me understand how people in the future will be addressing this issue, and this project was able to show me this.
