Remembering back to my first ever blog post, I referred to
how hard my heart was pounding and the overwhelming butterflies in my stomach
during move in day. As we now move in to the second half of the first semester,
it is a crucial time to find what is working and what isn’t.
Midterm grades were posted in
Banner this past week, and I was actually shocked at how pleased I was with
them. Personally, I have always been the type to be so critical about myself
and especially in school with my grades, but I feel that my hard work and
dedication to my education this semester has paid off so far. My midterm grades
are as follows: A, A, A-, B+, and B. These grades are pleasing in that they are
contributors to a good GPA and also a proof of putting school work first. The first
few weeks of school I can admit that social aspects were overtaking and I found
myself focusing on being with friends more than learning and doing my work. After
a quick reality check, I realized my purpose here at Southern was to get an
education and swiftly turned the other way.
Over the course of the first half
of the semester, my successes have been completing my homework faithfully and
putting in my best effort into completing various assignments. I feel I have
been able to set a good amount of time in each day to work on school work and manage
my time efficiently. As I look back, I also can say that I have truly retained a
lot of information over the past few weeks here at Southern and it is crazy how
intriguing and good it feels to learn college level material and obtain college
level thinking. With all of these good habits being said, I can definitely
still work on my study skills. During my advising meeting, we discussed going
to the Study Skills Enrichment Office or even tutoring to see what they have to
offer. I can only benefit from taking the extra mile so I plan to take advantage
of these services. Also, my reading still isn’t up to where I want it to be. I really
need to focus on reading the book for history as it will support and embellish
the professor’s lecture and I will be able to retain the notes I took down in
the lecture. Another way of going about this is to make a skeleton outline
ahead of time so I know what to expect and have foreshadowed what we will be
learning.
Looking ahead, I want to set a few
attainable goals for myself. Gradually, my participation has been getting
better in that I feel there is no reason not to participate and it really makes
the classroom environment more dynamic. I will get more out of what we are
discussing in class and be able to remember my thought process and comments, as
well as my peers’ opinions while engaging in the classroom. Furthermore, I would
really like to keep my work ethic and motivation up because completing all of
my assignments is obviously working in my favor and enhances what we learn
during class. A new strategy I can try, however, is to start my assignments
ahead of time so that I can manage my time better and take time to really think
about the assignment so I fully learn what needs to be learned.
I am excited to see what the second
half of the semester brings for me and how my new strategies will play out. I
am also interested in how far I can actually push myself to do and might be
able to surprise myself!
How can our strengths help to pave
the way to success? What are ways to make sure we are striving to be the best
we can be? Are your eyes always directed on your goals & dreams?
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