All the study skills that you worked so hard will benefit you in personal and professional life.
Going to college to receive a higher education could be one of the biggest obstacles of your life. If it is not the biggest obstacle than it’s certainly the most important. Frank Bruni’s opening question is more appealing to the transition from HighSchool to College. In HighSchool we were all taught to think a certain way when completing any task that dealt with learning. We were taught to remember and understand any work that was taught to students. Even when teachers gave test, they were only testing your ability to remember the material given. High school teachers’ number one objective was for students to remember what is said to pass the exam. However, in college these thinking skills are not acceptable. So approaching Frank Bruni’s opening question “‘What’s the most transformative educational experience you’ve had?’” I had to approach this question with higher thinking or else it would be a High School placement essay. I responded by of course using a little remembering and understanding because I have to understand the words in the question and remember the meaning of them. However, I mostly used theoretical ideas, some logic, understood the value of the question, and finally I combined all of my approaches to see how it would positively increase my diversity in college knowledge.
First off, who I am as a learner has changed over the past years. At times before, I wouldn’t take certain classes or assignments seriously and have learned my lessons when I failed. I believe having classmates at the time who weren’t as focused as I wanted to be, played a big role in my lack of understanding in classes. I understood later that if I felt learning was so important to me, I need to realize that it is my future and I needed to focus on my own. Having learner in my top 5 strengths defines me very well. Rath (2007) explains that, “The process, more than the content or the result, is especially exciting for you” (p.133). I believe this defines me as a learner because I enjoy having books in hand, opening up my notebook to write notes and learning new ways to understand the class. Regardless if the content is something I have to get in to or if I don’t do well on tests, I enjoy the process of studying and learning more even when I know I didn’t do so well; that is what motivates me. I believe as long as I keep this mindset and understand that this is my strength, I will continue to grow and further my education as much as possible. Even though I have failed a few of my last classes, I never let that stop me from continuing. Knowing that I have “failed” makes me realize I know I can do better and I try my hardest not to let it get me down. I will not get further if I don’t keep trying and as a learner I am a motivator to myself in my studies.
Life skills play an important role for becoming successful professionally and improving our personal lives. Oprah, in her lifeclass video, talks about being responsible for yourself and not waiting for anyone else to change the circumstances around you as a way to develop the skills necessary to flourish. The story of Robert Sherfields first experience at community college, “How Community College Changed My Life” tells of how Mr. Sherfield let go of his past failures and worked toward a better future for himself. The quote by Charles Noble “First we make our habits, then our habits make us!” is great to remember when developing the life skills necessary to continue to grow in all aspects of our lives. The video, story and quote can all be connected, good habits produce responsible people. Responsible people are aware of their
An experience that has made a profound impact on my life was when I directed and completed a community service project to fulfill a requirement for the Eagle Scout Award in the Boy Scouts of America. In order to competently act as coordinator for this service project, I had to develop both my interpersonal communication and leadership capabilities to a proficient level. Besides improving my professional skills, this project gave me the opportunity gain hands on experience working with groups of people who had varying skill levels. So, not only did these skills allow me to complete the project successfully, they have also proven incredibly useful throughout my academic career.
I like to read legendary people’s thoughts. It makes me see things from different perspectives. As I went through the Internet last week, I read Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.’s thoughts about life. There was this sentence that I really like. He said “A moment's insight is sometimes worth a life's experience.” It makes me think of what I’m doing right now. Talking about experience, I learned quite a lot of things at the first PD. The most obvious thing that I learned was not to be a quitter. I couldn’t just quit when they told me to do the introduction for 30 seconds. I couldn’t just quit when they told me to do the activities. I had to do it, and at the end of the day, I felt pretty satisfied of myself. It could be applied in many situations in my future, especially at the times when I will finally have a job for a living. Thinking about what I learned at my first PD reminds me of the typical saying that I’m sure everybody knows, “nothing worth having comes
People’s experiences shape their lives and influence the choices they make, their expectations, and formulate their behavior and mindset. I have always loved to learn! As a child, I was constantly at the library and playing school. I recall being in 5th grade when my teacher handed me the science manual and a box of equipment, and asked me to ‘figure it out’ and recreate it for the class. I couldn’t have been more thrilled!
One experience that has been particularly meaningful to me is my experience playing varsity football. Not only has this experience been the highlight of my high school career, but it has also been one of the most worthwhile experiences I have had. While participating in football, I have not only built many relationships that will last a lifetime, but I have also learned many lessons that I may not have learned without football. I learned how to deal with great diversity, whether it be on a small scale, such as responding to an unfortunate play, or on a larger scale, such as bouncing back from a season ending defeat. I have also learned the importance of hard work, perseverance, and
The experience I had that changed my way of thinking and will influence my goals at
This is an experience I never thought I would have but it’s important because It helped me change as a person and to not take things for granted and work hard to achieve things you want my thoughts about school changed because I remember complaining about getting homework even though it's only a few hours of homework but now I know things could be much worse and that I am happy that I only have four homework assignments instead of ten I learned a life lesson that if you work hard enough you can achieve
Participations in small in-class groups which purpose was to accomplish a task assigned to us by our Professor, were the most powerful learning experiences for me. In developing common focus, as stated in Gitterman and Germain (2008), members need to establish group rules and also remember to “build on one another’s contributions, identify and focus on salient collective themes, invite expression of differences” (p. 174), as well as welcome opinions which are contradictory or different from the majority.
Since I was a young girl, learning was something necessary to do in order to mature into my own self. It's something us as humans do to evolve from our younger selves. From learning to talk, walk ,and read we learn many things throughout our lifetime to be the person we are today. Learning is the key to life. Learning makes us progress. Riding a bicycle was a learning experience that I might never forget it.
Most of life's situations are learning experiences. People can learn what activities are right or wrong for them by experiences these emotions in different situations. These learning experiences can take place at home, school, the workplace, or anywhere else. The three major experiences that have given me confidence in my ability to learn have all taken place at Penn State University.
It was one life-changing experience I was seven years old when I became grateful for the things that I had. I remember packing for this big trip my parents were planning for a year now. I precisely recall my mother telling me to go through my closet and pick clothes I did not use to give away, I didn't know why, but I didn't ask, I just did it. As the day got closer I remember my parents had accumulated a great amount of things to give away. I quite didn't understand why they were gathering so many things and for what reason.
believe our life experiences can bring us many different learning opportunities if taken. Which can bring