I had my midterm last week and it went pretty well. I was more nervous than I thought I would be. The feedback I got was mostly positive. I got some criticism but the comments were all things that I expected. I made some mistakes which is fine. I think that most people enjoyed my speech.
I’ve learned a lot about myself because of the speech. I learned that sharing personal experiences can help me connect with the audience. I learned that I get more nervous when people are looking at a sheet of paper than looking at me. I thought it would be better if all their eyes weren’t on me, but it was the opposite. I felt like they were only looking to see if I hit all the marks on the rubric instead of listening completely. I know that was their job, but something about eye contact is important to me (which I didn’t know before).
How I spent my time preparing for the midterm was very important. I figured out what I wanted to do and the layout pretty early. However, I feel like I could’ve finished my poster earlier than I did. For the most part, I think I spent my time wisely. Something I am proud of is convincing some people that meditation is actually cool by telling them why they should try it.
For the next couple of months, I want to focus more on the brain and genetics. I also want to do some interviews because a few judges said I should’ve reached out to professionals. I am hoping to do this for my next SDA. Overall I’m very happy with how it went.
