Month: October 2018

Softball Pre-season

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As mentioned previously, I have decided to leave medical society in preference of Softball. I decided that softball would be a good fit for me as it is a sport that I enjoy as well as one based around a team dynamic. As I am a person that prefers to work alone and sometimes gets irritable when working with others, I thought that it may be a good challenge for me to play a very team-based sport.

It has been a challenge for me for the past few sessions of staying motivated as the action begins at 6:30 am, I am not a morning person. I have enjoyed the first few sessions despite being very tired during, I have had a lot of fun. I feel that this shows the LO4 as although I have enjoyed the experience, being able to get up willingly every Monday and Thursday at 5:30 am has been a large challenge. Keeping motivated for this activity will be difficult, I, therefore, believe that it elucidates LO4.

All we have done so far is play games, which has been amazing. It is fun to play with people who are passionate about a sport and enjoy each other’s company. I have played well so far and hope to continue this throughout preseason and into the regular season.

RDA CONTINUED

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In recent weeks at RDA, we have been focusing on developing the movement and decision-making capabilities of our partners. This has been done through the increase in physically demanding activities which we undertake as well as attempting to give them a larger amount of freedom on the horse. For example, as my partner does not necessarily have any issues in terms of physical capabilities, we mainly focused on developing her decision-making skills by momentarily handing control of the horse to her.

She was led through a zigzag course in which she had to steer left and right very quickly and finished the course by halting the horse without any aid from us or the leaders.

It is important that we give our partner (Janna) a challenge as if she becomes bored she begins to jump around and yell on the horse. This is very problematic as it is very unsafe for both her and everyone around her. We must continue to challenge Janna so that she can both progress as well as develop control of herself and the horse. It has been a real challenge to keep Janna under control and at some points becomes very dangerous. I believe that persevering in providing Janna with a goal and challenge, I am demonstrating LO4 as well as LO1. For LO4 I  actively respond to challenges as they arise, for me, communicating and working in areas outside of my comfort zone is extremely difficult. RDA provides me with a means to push my self, both in taking a leading role in undertaking activities with Janna as well as working in a place that is the opposite of where I usually spend time. In terms of LO1, I identified my issue with communication and decided that RDA would be a good push for me and it would lead me to develop my communication skills.

Medical society

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After attending for three weeks, I have made the decision to drop med soc in preference of softball pre-season and possibly DJ club or marimba. The reason I decided to leave was that I found little reason to stay. The activity itself was described to me by one of the chairs as an activity for those who are interested in medicine and the discussion of topical diseases, it was described as a congregation of people who are interested in medical science and discussing the topic. However, what was not accurately elucidated was the fact that it was an activity meant specifically for students who were considering a degree in medicine and is not suitable for those who are just interested in the subject. I signed up hoping to carry out case studies (Case-based learning) and watch a series of surgeries and discuss what we had seen. However, the only thing that we did in the three weeks was looking into how certain universities require certain grades and specific tests such as the UKCAT and BMAT. This was something that, not only was uninteresting but also completely irrelevant to me, meaning that not only was it boring, but it was also a complete and utter waste of time. In addition to this, the members often laughed at me for not being interested in perusing medicine (despite me having more knowledge than them in the field and having more shadowing experiences). I found it degrading to sit in a room full of people who thought less of me due to my greater interest in engineering than medicine and was also bored out of my mind. It was a shame that I couldn’t continue but it made no sense to do so. In the end, I had no choice but to quit.

PSE reflection

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How will you apply your knowledge of identity, personality types, emotional intelligence and self-talk to your journey through the IB?

From this unit I have discovered that I am somewhat lacking in emotional intelligence and rely too much on other intelligence to compensate. I have discovered that I exhibit a large number of traits held by non-emotionally intelligent people and realised that this finding links to what I have experienced in other aspects of my life, particularly social. From this, I now know to work on my communication skills as well as my ability to maintain myself, eg getting a sufficient amount of sleep and not drinking too much coffee

As well as the emotional intelligence portion of the unit, we looked at how we as individuals fit into groups and cliques. We discussed the ideas of whether or not we chose who we connect with. Personally, I believe that we do choose who we connect with and establish relationships with, as well as having to ability to change those groups as well. However, I believe that we do not choose the cultural and personal groups we are immediately involved with since birth. These were things like the home country and religion.Personally, despite living most of my life in Singapore, I still hold a deep connection and love for my home country of Australia and will never not perceive myself as anything other than Australian