Witness To War

The Witness to War: Serving a Nation oral history project focuses on telling veterans’ stories. Pairs of students interview a veteran, create a website for them, and present their veteran's story to their class. My partner, Kajsa Simon, and I interviewed Mr. Joe Souza, and through him, I learned a lot about the military as well as what makes a hero. From the Witness to War project, I learned that all veterans are heroes and that you don’t have to risk your life every day to be one. I also learned how to be a better public speaker, and this will be useful all throughout my life. This was the best project I have ever done, and it has made a lasting impact on my life. In this essay, I will discuss what I learned from this project, what I did to
When I first heard about it, all I could think about was how much work it would require. I learned that there are many definitions of a hero and that not all heroes serve on the front lines. I also learned valuable presentation and speaking skills. Preparing for the presentation made me better at speaking to a group of people, and the next time I have to do a presentation, I will not be so nervous. I also learned about what it means to be heroic. Before this project, my idea of a hero was someone who served on the front lines in wars, but now I see that not all heroes do that. Our veteran, Joe Souza, didn’t see any combat during the time of his service, but I still believe he is a hero. He served his country by joining the armed forces, and most people wouldn’t be willing to do that. This taught me that heroes do things that other people can’t and won’t do. They can be the person who helps everybody out, volunteers in their community, or goes out of their way to make someone happy. There are many heroes in our lives, such as teachers or nurses. Even though they aren’t in danger, they are still heroic because they live to help other people. Joe is a hero because he did something not everyone could do. When he served, he was protecting America, even if he never used a gun. Above all, this project taught me that heroes don’t have to be in danger or do
She did a great job, and I believe we worked well together. Kajsa contributed a lot to this project. She came up with a list of questions for the interview, she spent time on the transcript, and she wrote out a general script for the presentation, which I later edited. The only thing about her that I did not like was when we were choosing a veteran. We called different veterans that we had found, and she would not let me talk to them. She told me that they would expect her to call them, but I argued that I should also be able to speak with them since we would both be interviewing them. When we called Joe, we expected to choose him for our veteran; however, I told her that I thought we should not tell him in the first call that we were going to choose him. I wanted to have a chance to discuss our options because I would not be on the phone with him and, even though I asked, she would not put it on speaker phone. Regardless of what I said, she proceeded to interview Joe and tell him that we would be choosing him. While this was not a big deal, I had wanted to help with the phone calls and decision making, but she excluded me. Because of this issue, I volunteered to be the question-asker during the interview to make up for the small amount of work that I did not do. Other than that, we worked well together and had no more problems during the rest of the project. We had fun doing the project, and we made a good team. Because Kajsa was a good