For my final project I wanted to do something that would be different from everyone else. I wanted to cover the history of the Latino culture on the south side. At first I had trouble finding anything about how the Latino community started there, until my professor suggested a book entitled, Latinos in Milwaukee. This book provided me with a great source of history, also this book was written by a professor I had a couple semesters earlier!
With this newly found information I was able to construct a chronological order starting with the first Latino to come to Milwaukee in 1884 then working my way through their culture and other facts finally ending with the children that I did my service learning with today. I thought this showed how the children and their parents have kept their culture and how far they have come to be here today. Another element that I added was the text that I use in the movie. When I am talking about the past I used not only black and white pictures but an old “typewriter” font to give it an old feel to the video. When I transitioned into pictures of my service learning I not only used color pictures but I used a more “modern” font to bring us back to the present.
After I presented my final video to the class, the professor suggested that I have an interview or video from the internet about how the current immigration bill has affected this community and it would also show that the struggle still continues.
Through doing the service learning and also researching for this project I have learned that the Latino culture is rich in culture and tradition. I had a great time with the service learning part of the class. The children taught me so much about their culture and about how important patience is when dealing with kids! Hopefully I can see these kids more this summer, because I have applied to be a summer school teacher!
