Month: September 2018

Spanish is one of the main subject where I have faced multiple feelings towards. Currently, I feel that I am closer to having a fixed mindset on this because I did it for fewer years as compared to everyone else as I’ve only done it for 2 years now but everyone else has been doing it since middle school. This is because I keep switching schools and in my old school, the teacher was super sweet and I really liked her so I found myself wanting to do well to make her proud. However, she wasn’t a very good teacher so I felt that it was really hard to do well and I also had many more important subjects that I prioritised. So in that year, grade9, in my old school was the first year I did Spanish and I failed all my exams with a grade which was most of the time below 5. When I switched to UWC in grade10, I did Spanish again. This time I hated the teacher and she hated me. She had a fixed mindset towards me and so I did too. The fact that she was strict, however, forced me to prioritise her work which was also practice. Although I didn’t like her or the subject, being forced to do it increased my understanding of the language which then made it easier for me to study because I had the motivation in me. Nearing the end of the year, she began to notice my improvements and started to spend more time and effort into pushing me to do even better. I ended up 1 mark away from an A* in my IGCSEs which was mostly because of her teaching.

How will you apply your knowledge of identity, personality types, emotional intelligence and grit to your journey through IB?

Throughout the classes we’ve had, I had the opportunity to explore my identity, personality, emotional intelligence and level of grit. I was able to understand the depth of each topic through a detailed analysis as a class and as an individual. We got to listen to stories from our teacher who told us about his experiences and other peoples experiences which allowed us to view situations from multiple different perspectives and also place ourselves in situations we have not necessarily been in. This also allowed me to view our discussions with an open mind and a generally compassionate approach.

Our first class was on understanding what identity meant. After doing some activities and having the chance to answer this question as an individual and with a peer, the class came to a conclusion that a persons identity is not adjectives such as friendly or outgoing. I agreed with this because I believe that a persons identity is based off where they are from, where they grew up, their experiences and requires a deeper analysis.

Personality traits, however, are the adjectives a person uses to describe themselves. We discussed 6 types of main personality traits: conscientiousness, adjustment, acceptance, curiosity, risk approach and competitiveness. We went through how having these traits would result in a successful person. Personally, I think that I am not extremely accepting of peoples ideas all the time because I’m very quick to make decisions and don’t over think or over plan when I work with a group. We got to find out more about our personality traits through a group activity which required us to categorise ourselves into people who act, speculate, care and pay attention to detail when working in a group. I found out that I act which means that I take risks and plunge into the action without considering the consequences.

The unit on emotional intelligence was honestly very helpful because I never really stopped to analyse my behaviour or my emotions. Realising how I feel and why I feel that way made me understand myself much better. Additionally, grit taught me to power through. Since IB is a long and demanding course, I aim to have grit in me so that I can get good grades but also manage my social life along with activities.