Original Work Speech

Weekly Report 20

This week, we continued giving speeches over our original work in class. I watched my peers’ presentations, noting the positive aspects of their speeches as well as the areas that could use improvement, in order to find out how to better present my own speech. 

I created a powerpoint to act as a visual aide throughout my speech, and included various charts and graphs in order to present my data to my audience in an engaging manner.  The speech will mainly be over the original work that I recently completed, and it will also cover my short term, mid term, and long term SMART goals for my future, as well as briefly touching on my experiences thus far with my mentor. The speech will be 20 to 25 minutes long, which is the longest speech we have had to present yet, so I have made sure to devote an appropriate amount of time to rehearsing my presentation.

I also created a formal proposal for my final product.  Dr. Schmitt, on one of my earlier mentor visits, suggested that I conduct interviews with child psychologists, child protective services case workers, family law defense lawyers, and potentially even victims of emotional abuse in order to determine the impact of emotional abuse, and to investigate whether it is actually being dealt with appropriately.

Weekly Report 19

This week, I completed another assessment of my time spent with my mentor, as well as beginning to prepare for my speech, which I will give next week.  As we near final presentation night, the speeches and presentations that we give in class become longer and more detailed, in order to prepare us to speak for a longer period of time.  The speech that I will be giving is roughly 25 minutes long, and focused mainly on my original work, which I completed last week. 

I also completed another mentor visit this week.  During the visit, our main focus was going over the important highlights of Dr. Schmitt’s career, so that I will be able to compile a thorough and accurate professional biography.  We also continued to discuss ideas for my original work, and by my next mentor visit, I will have lists of interview questions to ask lawyers, caseworkers for CPS, and child psychologists.  My original work will likely be focused on emotional neglect as a form of abuse, since it is defined as abuse by child protective services and regarded as extremely harmful by mental health care professionals,  but is often overlooked or not taken seriously in practice.

Evidence of Learning Assessment 3

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Weekly Report 17

This week I continued work on my original work. I was able to send out the survey and begin collecting data. Soon I plan to analyze the results of the survey to determine the traits in an “ideal” psychologist.

In class, we looked to the future, evaluating what we hoped to accomplish in and through the ISM program for the rest of this school year. We also reflected on the final products of former ISM students in order to figure out what is necessary to create a great final product. We realized that the best products have always been impactful, either to the individual’s field or to the community as a whole.

This week I was also able to find a mentor, Dr. Richard Schmitt. His more than thirty years of experience in psychology span a wide range of different aspects of the field, and I look forward to learning from him this semester. More information on Dr. Schmitt and his practice will be coming soon.

Evidence of Learning Assessment 2

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Weekly Report 16

This week, my focus was centered on my original work.  We are creating our own work and research to help the fields that we are studying this year.  For my original work, I am creating a survey designed to reveal which traits are most highly sought after in a psychologist, and which other important people in an individual’s life share the traits they look for in a psychologist. I plan to further analyze the data by breaking down which traits are most commonly preferred by different age groups and genders.

Hopefully, this data will provide an accurate representation of an “ideal” psychologist for each demographic group, and potentially allow for greater success in the field of psychology by showing psychologists what their clients are looking for and giving them opportunities to improve on in these areas to better serve their target demographic.