Tag: PSE

Personal and social education

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What Lockdown Has Taught Me…

 

Although lockdown has been quite lonely and frustrating at times, I have learned two very important lessons.

Learning in the time of COVID-19 is really frustrating and I realise how much I miss school. A big part of school is the interactions and connections with other people whether they are staff, cleaners, students, friends or teachers. School is very important and it boost both mental and physical well-being. However, I must be grateful for the school I go to in the sense of how much the school pays attention and cares for its students as well as being great school even during online learning. I live very comfortably compared to many other people around the world, so I have to look for the things I have. For crying out loud I even have a small pool. I might not be very rich or have a big house, but I have a great family culture that makes it very comfortable, cozy and relaxing to live in this environment. That is something I am eternally grateful for. I have learned a lot of new things from reading books, gardening, playing and practicing music, improving my flat ground skateboarding tricks and lots more.

The second lesson is more of a worry and hope for change. For me, it seems to be that climate change and environmental issues in general is the least of everyone’s worries in terms of problems for most people.  People feel like they don’t have the energy or time to think about the environment which is unfortunate but in many cases it is completely understandable. I sort feel like this pandemic is a glimpse to what the climate crisis can affect us. Although in some ways, the environment is getting better and that makes me feel so, so happy, people aren’t of course doing anything or have the time to think about the environment because of course, there is a pandemic going around. But I hope that when this is over, people will be more connected after the isolation and solve some of these issues around the world, especially climate change. But my worry is that this is not the case. I have also realised, that we can really help climate change by restricting our consumption and I think that is one fo the most effect strategies.

Anyways, these were just thoughts that have been circling around me and to really summarise, I am grateful for what I have and have learned that this isolation can really change us and hopefully the planet as well.

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Self Evaluation on Study Skills

For a few lessons in PSE, we have discussed a few study habits and what makes non-effective study habits so that in the future, we might have better luck on exams and tests. Through PSE, we have talked about several study skills such as:

  1. Retrieval Practice
  2. Elaboration
  3. Concrete examples
  4. Spaced practice
  5. Interleaving

So far, I find that I sometimes take the easy route that makes me feel good such as re-reading notes. This is a trap that I fall easily into and although I am very productive when there is a clear end goal like an essay or worksheet or piece of reading when it comes to studying where there is no clear end goal and requires perhaps more effort, I don’t do so well. This is sort of what happened during IGCSEs, and it does go well but there is always something more one can do.

Despite this, I have noticed that sometimes I do retrieve things from memory, ask and elaborate on things and spacing practice and interleaving things. In order to be better, I should think about when to apply these skills and not take the easy route, and perhaps even start doing some reviewing, perhaps not studying but a few daily reviewing of notes for the mock exams.

During lessons, I always listen and aware of what I’m learning, but the thing I really need to work on my notes. I rarely take notes but I know it is a good idea. I always have that vision, that I will have a notebook full of clean notes, but I just can’t do it. I may begin nicely but then over time, I am unable to meet my goal of producing notes in class. I have such a hard time with it. That is a big area I want to improve on during class. After class and at home, I review sometimes but perhaps not as often as I should.

Below is a pretty good guide that gives a good introduction to these skills above:

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Study+Guide+2

 

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Post on Selling My Strengths | PSE and UAC

Personality types and doing quizzes or tests to find out career choices or the personality traits one embodies is obviously just a guide or tool but not a definitive answer of course. I’m quite wary about personality types because not only does everyone embodies more than one singular personality types but also that people change and I’ve done the same quiz with two different results. In MaiaLearning, I took both the interesting quiz, based on the Holland Code, and the personality traits based on the “psychologist” Carl Jung.

Holland Code:

It’s clear that they are all quite tied but the three categories that apply to me most is investigative, artistic and realistic. This to me does make sort of sense, I do value the arts and am engage with it fully, but I’m also practical and like maths and science. To be honest, I really am interested in everything, even in categories that didn’t apply to me as much such as social (in some contexts I do like working with people). However, the question is what am I good at and what interests really resonates with me. and for me, the investigative, artistic and realistic, are probably the values I regard most in myself. The careers suggested included architects, archaeologists, astronomers, landscape architects, which are careers that do sound very appealing to me, especially architecture. Architecture is something I have been looking to for a few years because of the interests that are required. Architects need to be creative and be able to draw/sketch to communicate ideas, they work with a  variety of tools and materials from digital to old technology, they communicate with clients and work together with other people, they must be analytical but also investigative at times solving problems involving maths and science. These things sound very appealing to me and architecture might be a possible career. However, I might do something completely different in the future that may align with my other interests in music, other creative arts, environmental science and others.

This leads to a thought I have had recently in which life in this generation is both easier and harder. Despite having access to digital technology, good health care, education, safe environment and more (which I have access to due to my socioeconomic status), it hasn’t made life easier. In fact, it may have made it harder and now, you need much more, be able to do much more, have experienced much more to access the same universities, jobs, financial status and not to mention climate change that may ruin it all. I wonder what might happen to future generations, concerning universities and jobs. People are in education much longer now, because, in some ways, they need to. Maybe there will be something higher than a PhD or Doctorate in the future in order to gain that step ahead in a job application for instance.

Personality traits:

 

Although quite similar, the two scores I got was INTJ and INFJ. So despite being different, there are some familiarities and things I might gain insight from.

In summary, I am imaginative, creative, sensitive, intense and private. These qualities, I feel do sort of apply to me. I am possibly more introverted than extroverted especially at school, but there are times I do feel like I am more extroverted. I feel as though I have multiple personalities (which I am sure most people do) and I embodied them in different situations. So sometimes I am very quiet, but sometimes I am very outgoing and caring.

Now, despite being suspicious about personalities, I was almost surprised, intrigued and a bit scared that some things hold very true according to the results. For instance that I am a “private person, and you take time getting to know people and letting others get to know you,” that I have a “small group of close and trusted friends, and are generally cautious about jumping into new social situations” and being thorough and empathetic but (and this really resonated with me), “you will try hard to please the people you care about.” That is very true,

The results really brought the attention of who I am. I since I am a sceptical person, and it did say I was, scared that most of the things it said, is something I have realised in myself. One weakness I had was that I may be “confusing and not communicate clearly, not showing enough enthusiasm” which is almost 100% true, or at least in school. In other situations like with my family, I’m quite the opposite. I really have a hard time articulating my thoughts verbally, and can only communicate clearly when writing, or play music or draw. I know what I am thinking but I can put them to words sometimes.

Despite this, it might be so that I am forcing myself to align to these indicators that when I see these indicators I am certain that these apply to me when in fact there is some psychology behind it. In other words, it is human nature that we notice things that we sort of agree with and try to pinpoint things in our life that matches it. Instead of looking at the whole I am cherry-picking events in my life that align to these indicators so it feels like they apply to me.

There are lots more insights I gained and things I can learn from it so this test shook me up. The careers I was suggested included managers and funny side note, I was a 100% match for solar installation manager and I am currently working with other students in a solar panel installation group. Being a manager doesn’t seem very appealing to me but despite this, I do feel like the results were really helpful and almost accurate to the smallest detail.

 

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Steps for Emotional Intelligence and Empathy

Through PSE, I have sort of come to realise that in some situations (not all), I am quite anti-social or at the very least, quite bad at talking and making conversation. It may mean that I do not have high emotional intelligence and this is important as relationships are important for every individual and being able to maintain and create relationships is perhaps one way of success and happiness.  The reason that I may not talk so much is either because I am not comfortable he speaking or that I don’t have anything to say. So in order to be more emotionally intelligent, it really is about stepping out of my comfort zone and just going for it. Also, I should be more active constructive, meaning that I am not passive constructive where I just say oh great, or that’s nice and instead more enthusiastic and asking questions about the other person.

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Do You Get Enough Exercise?

Sometimes I am unsure if I have enough exercise. For a long time, exercise for me has been something that has seemed unnecessary to me. Nowawadys I have heard about classmates doing exercise on a regular basis, as in going to the gym three times a week. I have started to slightly consider to exercise and to start regularly do some sort of physical movement.

My parents have said that I need at least some sport every week, which I have always had. For instance, this week I will have basketball and badminton. I feel like I do not need any exercise because I already do some sports and quite regular physical movement.  In addition, sometimes I run with my dad and every weekend I do a physical activity whether that is swimming, badminton, cycling, football, basketball or any post. However, when I will not be at school anymore and enter the real adult world, I probably won’t have the chance to do any sort of sport regularly. I consider myself quite healthy, including nutritional and sleep wise. But I think I should consider exercise quite soon or start early so that when I am older, I know what I need to do to stay healthy.

I have learned that humans need some sort of physical activity every day because that is what we did thousands of years ago and perhaps even evolved to in order to stay active and alive. So, maybe, even though I might not need it now, to start to do a bit of exercise, probably not much because I don’t need it but in order to prepare for the future and to keep my body healthy in the future.

Anyways, here is something more meaningful. Why do we need exercise? If you search this on the internet you will get posts and links to say that exercise is good for ones’ wellbeing, you become less stressed, more confident, sleep better, more healthy and all that. But what I am asking is why is it necessary like eating or sleeping? We already know all the health benefits but it seems as though exercise should be considered as something with a similar stance to eating and sleeping.

If we do not have any physical movement in our lives, that will seriously affect us, and we know that. I mentioned that we “need some sort of physical activity every day because that is what we did thousands of years ago and perhaps even evolved to in order to stay active and alive.” To be honest I actually do believe that exercise should be regarded as something so fundamentally important as sleeping and eating.  But exercise doesn’t have to be push-ups and that sort of stuff. It can be as simple as walking, cycling, or doing a sport. In other words, we need physical movement in our lives and it is not something like a health option, something that makes you healthier. Exercise is as important as sleeping and eating.

This is my take on the question.