Seminar POL - end of sophomore year POL
32QS
Catelynn Anderson
POL 32Q
12/13/16
3 celebrations
My first celebration this year is how well I’ve adapted to the happy inclusive, and positive atmosphere of Animas. I switched from DHS to Animas this school year, and I saw a huge difference in how the students and teachers act, communicate, and support each other. For example, at DHS you most often don’t get a chance to communicate one-on-one with your teachers or build any kind of good relationship with them. I can tell that at Animas, the teachers actually care about if you succeed or not, which could not be something you’d say about the teachers at DHS. When you have a problem with something at animas and need help or support, you can go to almost anyone because of how accepting and supportive the environment is. At DHS I wasn’t ever able or comfortable enough to go to a teacher and really sit down, have a talk, and go over the problem I was having, and afterwards have a good feeling of resolution and support. I’m happy that I’ve began to adapt to this new environment and made many new friends, that I think are genuinely good people, unlike some of my old friends from DHS. Most of the kids from DHS have gotten used to being judgemental, and harshly stereotyping each other. There were many different distinct friend groups, and the people they consisted of only accepted one another in their certain clique. This put a lot of social and emotional stress on me because I started to feel that fitting in and having friends was more important than trying to do work and succeed academically. But after I switched, I realized that my peers at animas focus more on what’s important. Things such as doing good in school, accepting everyone even with all of their differences, and not only making a path to success for themselves, but helping others along with that goal as well. Most all of my new friends actually care about me, support me, and make me a happier person when I’m around them. I’m glad that I made the switch in schools because I think that myself emotionally and socially this year am doing much better than I was at DHS.
The second thing I’d like to celebrate is a certain biology project I did. I’ve seen a lot of procrastination in myself this year, which has hurt me academically and really stressed me out. During this certain project, I procrastinated throughout the entire thing and had to cram all of the work in at the very end which was very stressful. I felt stuck and frustrated with myself for never doing work outside of school and slacking off even in school. Near the end of this project I realized that I had to do something about this problem, and I had to realize that what I had been doing was wrong and that this problem should not happen again.
My final thing I’d like to appreciate is a song that I have been working on that I’m playing on the piano. It’s a complicated version of the song “Bohemian Rhapsody” that I was assigned this summer. And when I was first assigned this piece, I had been grounded from my phone and from leaving the house for two weeks. So, I decided to spend most of my downtime teaching myself this song because I was motivated to do so. And now, half way through the school year, I am almost done perfecting it. I am very proud of this because it is definitely one of the hardest pieces I have tackled, and I’m glad that I have found motivation to learn and complete it.
2 areas for growth
My first area for growth I’d like to talk about very much relates to some of the things I talked about in my places for celebration. First, I’d like to talk about my procrastination, where it comes from, and what it leads to. I started having a problem with “procrastination” a few years ago, when I found that I wasn’t happy with myself and decided to try to change who I was. I started socializing in class more than doing work, and this caused my grades to go down and my stress level to go up. Unfortunately, even after I solved the problem with how I thought about myself, the socializing in class issue and my lack of interest for doing school work became a bad habit. I started procrastinating more and more and now I’m really starting to see how much of a problem it has become. My grades, what teachers think of me, and the effort put into most of my school work greatly reflects this bad habit that has become of me. And after my problem with the biology project, I started to realize that this procrastination comes from a lack of motivation. I think that when I have work to do and I know that it would be best for me to complete as soon as possible, I just tell myself that “I can do it later”, or “It’s not that important”. I lie to myself, and I’ve figured out that I just simply don’t see how important all of the work I’m doing now really is. All of the procrastination and missing work starts to pile up, and then I’m stuck with a huge, irreversible problem that I know deep down will affect my future.
I’ve been starting to see that in truth, I have no idea where this huge lack of motivation came from. Then, I thought back to when I very first was starting to teach myself “Bohemian Rhapsody” on the piano, and how somehow I found motivation to really work hard and complete something cool like that. Then I remembered that when I first started to learn the song, I was grounded. I had no phone, I had nothing better to do. Maybe my “lack of motivation” comes from how I prioritize all of the things in my life. Maybe now, I still focus more on socializing with people on my phone or being with my friends as much as I can. I don’t see how important school is right now and how greatly the work I’m doing right now will affect my future. This, I have found, is a serious place where I have a lot of room for growth. If I don’t fix this now, my future could be greatly affected, and not in a good way.
My second place where I see room for growth is my switch in maturity, coming from DHS. Like I said before, the atmosphere at Animas is much more positive and supportive than that of the atmosphere at DHS, and I feel that I haven’t fully adapted to how people interact here. I feel that I am still used to the way people work at DHS, and that I could definitely improve my attitude towards everything so that I am as positive and accepting as everyone else here. I’ve noticed that at Animas, being rude and judgemental is not as common than it was at my old school, and when these actions happen here a much much different reaction occurs. From attending this school i’ve realized how pointless negative actions are, and that if you focus more on the important things such as succeeding, accepting, being positive, and treating people with equality, but still I don’t see the full switch in my actions that would reflect this new atmosphere. I definitely feel like I still have a lot of room for growth, and not only that but I actually want to see this change in myself, so that I can be an all around better person, fit in here, and succeed academically, socially, and emotionally here at Animas.
My question
First of all, going back to what I was saying before, where is the lack of motivation coming from and why am I not motivated to succeed in the areas that are most important?
Second, where can I find new motivation, so that in the next semester, and frankly throughout life, I can find overall success?
POL 32Q
12/13/16
3 celebrations
My first celebration this year is how well I’ve adapted to the happy inclusive, and positive atmosphere of Animas. I switched from DHS to Animas this school year, and I saw a huge difference in how the students and teachers act, communicate, and support each other. For example, at DHS you most often don’t get a chance to communicate one-on-one with your teachers or build any kind of good relationship with them. I can tell that at Animas, the teachers actually care about if you succeed or not, which could not be something you’d say about the teachers at DHS. When you have a problem with something at animas and need help or support, you can go to almost anyone because of how accepting and supportive the environment is. At DHS I wasn’t ever able or comfortable enough to go to a teacher and really sit down, have a talk, and go over the problem I was having, and afterwards have a good feeling of resolution and support. I’m happy that I’ve began to adapt to this new environment and made many new friends, that I think are genuinely good people, unlike some of my old friends from DHS. Most of the kids from DHS have gotten used to being judgemental, and harshly stereotyping each other. There were many different distinct friend groups, and the people they consisted of only accepted one another in their certain clique. This put a lot of social and emotional stress on me because I started to feel that fitting in and having friends was more important than trying to do work and succeed academically. But after I switched, I realized that my peers at animas focus more on what’s important. Things such as doing good in school, accepting everyone even with all of their differences, and not only making a path to success for themselves, but helping others along with that goal as well. Most all of my new friends actually care about me, support me, and make me a happier person when I’m around them. I’m glad that I made the switch in schools because I think that myself emotionally and socially this year am doing much better than I was at DHS.
The second thing I’d like to celebrate is a certain biology project I did. I’ve seen a lot of procrastination in myself this year, which has hurt me academically and really stressed me out. During this certain project, I procrastinated throughout the entire thing and had to cram all of the work in at the very end which was very stressful. I felt stuck and frustrated with myself for never doing work outside of school and slacking off even in school. Near the end of this project I realized that I had to do something about this problem, and I had to realize that what I had been doing was wrong and that this problem should not happen again.
My final thing I’d like to appreciate is a song that I have been working on that I’m playing on the piano. It’s a complicated version of the song “Bohemian Rhapsody” that I was assigned this summer. And when I was first assigned this piece, I had been grounded from my phone and from leaving the house for two weeks. So, I decided to spend most of my downtime teaching myself this song because I was motivated to do so. And now, half way through the school year, I am almost done perfecting it. I am very proud of this because it is definitely one of the hardest pieces I have tackled, and I’m glad that I have found motivation to learn and complete it.
2 areas for growth
My first area for growth I’d like to talk about very much relates to some of the things I talked about in my places for celebration. First, I’d like to talk about my procrastination, where it comes from, and what it leads to. I started having a problem with “procrastination” a few years ago, when I found that I wasn’t happy with myself and decided to try to change who I was. I started socializing in class more than doing work, and this caused my grades to go down and my stress level to go up. Unfortunately, even after I solved the problem with how I thought about myself, the socializing in class issue and my lack of interest for doing school work became a bad habit. I started procrastinating more and more and now I’m really starting to see how much of a problem it has become. My grades, what teachers think of me, and the effort put into most of my school work greatly reflects this bad habit that has become of me. And after my problem with the biology project, I started to realize that this procrastination comes from a lack of motivation. I think that when I have work to do and I know that it would be best for me to complete as soon as possible, I just tell myself that “I can do it later”, or “It’s not that important”. I lie to myself, and I’ve figured out that I just simply don’t see how important all of the work I’m doing now really is. All of the procrastination and missing work starts to pile up, and then I’m stuck with a huge, irreversible problem that I know deep down will affect my future.
I’ve been starting to see that in truth, I have no idea where this huge lack of motivation came from. Then, I thought back to when I very first was starting to teach myself “Bohemian Rhapsody” on the piano, and how somehow I found motivation to really work hard and complete something cool like that. Then I remembered that when I first started to learn the song, I was grounded. I had no phone, I had nothing better to do. Maybe my “lack of motivation” comes from how I prioritize all of the things in my life. Maybe now, I still focus more on socializing with people on my phone or being with my friends as much as I can. I don’t see how important school is right now and how greatly the work I’m doing right now will affect my future. This, I have found, is a serious place where I have a lot of room for growth. If I don’t fix this now, my future could be greatly affected, and not in a good way.
My second place where I see room for growth is my switch in maturity, coming from DHS. Like I said before, the atmosphere at Animas is much more positive and supportive than that of the atmosphere at DHS, and I feel that I haven’t fully adapted to how people interact here. I feel that I am still used to the way people work at DHS, and that I could definitely improve my attitude towards everything so that I am as positive and accepting as everyone else here. I’ve noticed that at Animas, being rude and judgemental is not as common than it was at my old school, and when these actions happen here a much much different reaction occurs. From attending this school i’ve realized how pointless negative actions are, and that if you focus more on the important things such as succeeding, accepting, being positive, and treating people with equality, but still I don’t see the full switch in my actions that would reflect this new atmosphere. I definitely feel like I still have a lot of room for growth, and not only that but I actually want to see this change in myself, so that I can be an all around better person, fit in here, and succeed academically, socially, and emotionally here at Animas.
My question
First of all, going back to what I was saying before, where is the lack of motivation coming from and why am I not motivated to succeed in the areas that are most important?
Second, where can I find new motivation, so that in the next semester, and frankly throughout life, I can find overall success?