What we learned and How it Ties In

Over the 6 weeks we have been learning new material in class and while they are all different readings they seem to connect well together because they help us not only become a better student but help us become better problem solvers and how to manage our life better to.

At first the reading were sort of plain because it talked about how to college is different and how to manage your time wisely. Something’s that upcoming freshmen’s new already. But as the weeks progress the more and more the reading became more relevant to us students. During the course of college I was able to get useful information and apply them into my studies in my other classes. I think that these readings aren’t just homework for us to do but its kind of a student guide on being a better student than you think you are.

One of the article that I connected the most with was the intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation. Reason why it stood out to me is because it gave me the chance to think about what kind of motivation motivates me to do better in anything I do. First for those who forgot what intrinsic and extrinsic motivation is well intrinsic motivation is motivation based on taking pleasure and in an activity rather working an external reward. Extrinsic motivation comes from outside such as performing for money or reward. So after reading that article I came to the realization that I have an extrinsic motivation because for instance I’m in college to have a great career. And I came to realize that with having extrinsic motivation it came have a positive and negative conflict.

This week we have talked about grit, and how it relates to being able to work through tough problems. In the Angela Duckworth article she share that “the grittiest students not the smartest ones have the highest GPAs”. In my opinion the reason why they had the highest GPAs is because they had motivation to be excellent at what they do and they either had intrinsic or extrinsic motivation to have a high GPA. 

6V. Persistence

When I searched the word Persistence on Merriam-webster dictionary it gave me, Persistence means the quality that allows someone to continue doing something or trying to do something even though it is difficult or opposed by other people.

I find that this word is important to a college student because throughout college majority of the student use persistence during midterms, finals and to graduate on time.

Without have persistence it would be much harder to live in the real world because all you would do is quit and not try.

New Words

Durability- able to exist for a long time without significant deterioration

Endurance- the ability to do something difficult for a long time

6A. Getting Over A Challenge

A significant challenge that I faced in my life was completing the UAP program during the summer. Reason why it was a challenge was because if I didn’t complete it successfully with at least Ct, then I wouldn’t be able to attend SCSU. The workload that they handed out was ridiculous, I mean homework everyday and an essay due every Friday. It was something that I was not use to and very hard to complete. I also think the reason why it was hard for me was because I really didn’t want to be there because it was summer time and I just finished high school and all I wanted to do was go out and hang out with friends before they leave off to college. But I knew it was something that I had to overcome because I knew that if I did not focus on the work then I wouldn’t be attending SCSU. During the UAP it taught me how to be a stronger student and how college life would be like. So far they were right but the workload isn’t as bad the work during the UAP. Some of the strategies that that I employed was doing my work and paying attention to what the professor was teaching and also to stay focus on myself without the distractions that my friends were doing. One thing that kept me on task was that we were not allowed to have a T.V. and that was useful because T.V. is a huge distraction now thinking about it. Reason is because whenever I did my homework with the T.V. on I found it hard to concentrate because I would pay more attention to the T.V then my actual homework.

After completing the UAP program I knew that I was ready for college I felt more confident knowing that I wouldn’t feel lost and stuck doing homework or writing an essay.

5I. Art

Since starting college as a commuter student at SCSU I always park in lot 9 and every day I noticed a piece of art that is always.

I don’t even know what the name of it is but for some reason it always catches my eyes because it’s something that I never seen before. The structure of it is made of metal and rocks and it is very unique. My mission for the upcoming weeks in my spare time I will try and find out what’s the name it and where it originated from.

here's a picture of it

5B. Time Schedule Reflection

For the past week my INQ teacher told us to keep a time schedule to show what each student does each hour and my there were some outrageous numbers of hours students were doing. But in class our professor told us to break the time schedule into sections and the biggest sections that she wanted recorded was the number the hours you do your homework/ time your doing outside work and the number of hours you socialize throughout the week. As I started to calculate the total of hours I did each activity, the amount of homework/ time doing my work outside of class was 23 hours. According to her statics in class I fell into the C range of a typical college student because the students who do at least 40 hours a week earn an A, students who do 30 hours a week fall into the B range, students who fall into the 20 hours earn a C, students who do 10 hours are in the D range and for 0 hours are in the F range.

Doing this experiment taught me a lot about my self and things that I need to work on the most. Some of the things that I need to work on are that I tend to procrastinate quite often and that leads me to either do homework late or finish early because I don’t want to do it or just quit.  With doing this week schedule it was sort of a wake up call for me and I’m glad that I did it.

When it came for me to calculate the total of number of socializing I did over the week it came out to be about 18 hours and I felt that that was a great amount due to the fact that I still manage to get things done and still have time for my friends.  Which is always good so that you have that balance with your academics and personal life.

Over the course of my studies in college I plan on being more organized and making sure that I set a set schedule for myself to follow because throughout my education life I have always been on a set schedule and I learn best when I have one because now that I am in college I really don’t have a set schedule and that’s why I feel that I procrastinate on so many things.

 Heres a quick 3min video on creating a schedule for college.

5v. Agency

Agency

When I searched them term “agency” on Google the definition that it gave me was a business or organization established to provide a particular service, typically one that involves organizing transactions between two other parties.

For instance “Social Work Agency”. 

When I searched agency in the Merriam-webster website the def. they gave me was
1

a :  the office or function of an agent

b :  the relationship between a principal and that person's agent

2

:  the capacity, condition, or state of acting or of exerting power

I can relate to this term is because after I graduate college with my bachelors degree in Social Work I plan on working for an agency that deals with what I’m passionate about.