As I reminisce over my experience at the natural science museum, I truly feel like I’ve had a “Night at the Museum” experience. In other words, a “behind the scenes” look at a totally different world. Much of that experience is thanks to my mentor, Dr. Julia Stevens. My internship was much more than a tourist’s walkthrough of the museum. In fact, I feel like I am now part of the family of the museum. That is the way I was treated on a daily basis, and I continue to experience this support system. It’s truly humbling that my mentor chose a Language Arts teacher to take on the challenges of a microbiology lab, and I learned so much about teamwork and collaboration. To be honest, I feel like Dr. Stevens took a chance on me, and I hope that I was able to meet the challenge. It was a very special experience to contribute my Language Arts ideas to many experiments that we were working on in the lab. What an “Aha” moment when I was able to start seeing these connections between two totally different worlds and to have my mentor also excited was a great reward. I look forwarding to sharing the completion of my efforts with my mentor and to continue communicating with her to further bridge a connection between the Language Arts and Science worlds and to be able to show my students the value of building meaningful relationships with the community.
