1. Where is your learning going? How will you apply skills, qualities you’ve developed outside of IFP.
   The learning experience I have gained from IFP has supported me and the skills I had developed long before.  I had always seen myself as a hard worker who is resilient and will get my work done when needed. IFP taught me a lot about being resilient in different aspects of work, it taught me how to communicate and be resilient in real life situations. I felt that my learning is heading in the direction where I can translate from behind a computer or piece of paper by myself to being in real life and communicating with others to solve issues and problems.
2. What have you learned about collaboration? Have you learned to be more effective when working with others? What’s your biggest obstacle when asked to contribute to a team?
   Through IFP, I have learnt that collaboration is more than just doing my fair share of work.  I used to believe that as long as I did my own work in the group I could leave it and just be done. However, over the course of IFP, I realised there was much more to collaboration, an example I experienced was when we were asked to teach a game in pairs. As a pair, we were told to explain a certain game and make sure we present it as formal and as suitable as possible. I realised this wasn’t something I could just say my part and be done, my partner also helped me realise this by helping me midway during the explanation when I’d forget something or mess something up. In other words, I learnt to be more caring and self-aware when working with others. Though I may be resilient and try to do my part by myself, learning that I have a team to help me has changed who I am in terms of collaboration. However, despite this, I still feel that speaking up when contributing is an issue. I tend to have a soft voice with people I am uncomfortable with and will hold back ideas if I believe they have flaws.
3. In what ways have you been a mentor to others this year? Where and when have you shown initiative?
   During the mentor group session, I felt that I took initiative in that session by speaking first and trying to get my partner to speak, due to both of us being quiet, it forced at least one of us to take initiative and spark a conversation. By doing this I essentially tried to mentor my peer talking to her about our poems and asking more questions to give her ideas about the poem she could talk about.
4. Which session has done the most to address your areas for improvement as a peace builder? How did that session encourage growth?
   I felt that the lead facilitation session really addressed the areas for improvement as a peace builder. As said before, I had always been a soft-spoken person and won’t share ideas unless I am completely sure of them. The lead facilitation session really encouraged me to speak out my ideas when I realized my group had been filled with people completely like me. People who didn’t share their ideas and rather decided to keep to themselves. From this, I decided that if we were going to get any work done I might as well take a risk and try to take initiative by getting some ideas in. The session really showed myself growing more as a peace builder, showing how I had learnt to take risks and go out of my comfort zone.
5. What have you learned about leadership & what qualities and skills have you developed in IFP to help do this?
   I felt that my learning from IFP has taught me how to be a way more effective communicator and has pushed me out of my comfort zone. A specific moment that helped this was during the social media session where we would have to go to different corners and pair up with someone randomly. This forced me to be with other people that I hadn’t really talked to and gave a new view, this was something that I wasn’t particularly comfortable with. However, I realized that it was the perfect time to push myself out of my comfort zone. From there, talking to new people and speaking with others became much easier for me, it became a skill that wouldn’t be my strongest but would be something I could rely on. Asides from communication, as mentioned before I felt that I learnt more about being a risk taker and taking initiative, which coincidentally are skills of being a leader(in my opinion). This I found ironic, as all my life I had never seen myself as a leader, I had always been someone who would make their fair contribution into a project but I had never really been a leader. This taught me about being a leader and what it was like, and though its something I’m not fond of, it’s interesting to see how my leadership skills could develop so quickly though one session.
6. What has your engagement in IFP looked like your peers? What makes you say so?
   In IFP, overall, my engagement would most likely not look so good, I have not been one to speak out during sessions so often and thus they might think I wouldn’t have as strong of a passion as they do. However, I would like to say that I do have that passion and that I am engaged, I just prefer to show this in smaller groups or with people that I have spoken to already. And I felt that an example of this was in our listening session where we practised having better one on one conversations, in both situations where I had to group up with people I didn’t know. These people were surprised when we had recorded the conversation as they thought I wasn’t going to contribute at all. I even had some people ask me if I was thinking of quitting IFP.

Learning objectives:

LO1 Awareness

• What am I good at? What are my strengths?
• What would I like to improve?
• How has my involvement in this activity made me aware of my strengths and areas for growth?
• Have I improved and in what areas? How do I know?
• Why have I struggled in some areas?