Reflection on Video

I managed my time pretty well on this project because I finished almost a week early. I knew I wouldn’t be able to do it this weekend because my best friend is coming home from Delaware Sate College for the weekend.  The day it was assigned I started interviewing people.  My CC’s were great and really willing to help. I thought asking them how they got involved would be informative to anyone who watching my video that wanted to get involved but didn’t know how to go about it.  Interviewing and putting together the video was the easiest part of the project.  I struggled more with picking a topic.  I achieved most of my goals on this project because I got it done in a timely manner and I made a few good points while interviewing each person, for example asking the faculty if kids more involved had higher or lower GPAs. I balanced my video pretty well with my voce the person I was interviewing, music and pictures. I think my video was interesting and informative because I asked a variety of different people who knew what they were talking about.  I also utilized every feature I could on Windows Live Movie Maker to make it visually appealing.  The biggest conclusion I drew from my video was to get involved, because that’s what my whole video was based off of.     

blog viedo #1

Safari #9 Involvement Fair

Last week I attended the student involvement fair.  While I was there I was so impressed with the amount of clubs Southern has to offer.  Two that really caught my eye were Alpha Sigma Alpha Sorority and Best Buddies.  Alpha Sigma Alpha is a national sorority and initially formed in Virginia at Longwood University November 1901.  Alpha Sigma Alpha does a lot with the Special Olympics which really interests me because I enjoy helping special needs kids.  Best Buddies and Alpha Sigma Alpha are similar because they both work with special needs kids, but best buddies spends more time with each child because each of us get our own buddy.  I think I’m going to join Best Buddies instead of the sorority because Greek week is over and Best Buddies is a better fit for me because you really get to know your special needs individual.             

Involvement

The topic I chose for my video is involvement.  I chose this topic because during our class discussions about campus and SCSU as a whole most of them pertained to involvement or being pro active which are one in the same in some respects.  Also because I think as a new student at a somewhat large university it’s important to be a part of something and not another face in the crowd.  The main questions I’m going to cover in my video are how to get involved, does the university do a good job at trying to get students involved, do students who are involved in SCSU clubs or teams have higher or lower GPAS and what would be a main reason why a first year student would or wouldn’t want to get involved.  These questions are important to first year students because knowing how to get involved is the first step to joining a club or team. Weighing out the pros and cons are also important because even though they could be for each person mostly everyone has the same general concerns.  Determining whether people who are involved have higher or lower GPA’s is crucial.  Once again it depends on what kind of person you are, but in general if kids involved have higher GPA’s it’s something to consider doing if your grades are subpar.  These questions will make for a interesting video because knowing the opinion of faculty, CC’s and other first year students may or may not change your opinion on being involved.  Also each person’s answer will be different therefore giving a variety of opinions that will be able to connect with each different person watching it.  Essentially I hope my video can relate to everyone, and leave the audience thinking about whether getting involved is or isn’t for them.     

Where Does The Time Go?

After recording my time for the past six days I realize that I spend most of my time in class or studying.  This study showed me that managing my time by writing it down helps me accomplish much more.  In a sense, scheduling my time holds me accountable for where every minute of my time goes. This makes me participate in more deliberate practice rather than going through the motions.  This week I spent 26 hours studying and doing homework, 19 hours exercising, eating, working or hanging out with friends and the rest of my time in class or sleeping.  In my opinion, this is a well balanced schedule for a first year college student.  Eating surprisingly took up more time than I thought it was going to.  Strictly because of the time it takes to walk to the café, get food, sit down, socialize for a bit and walk back.  I didn’t procrastinate this week, although I did save my hardest assignments for last which is a bad habit I need to break.  Next week I’m going to schedule my time better by focusing on my harder assignments first because this will save me some time on homework.  Hopefully by doing that it will give me more time to sleep. Throughout the semester I’m going to try to keep doing this because as I said before it makes me do more deliberate practice rather than just getting something done.  I also learned from this assignment that making to do lists is crucial part of succeeding in college.  I have a planner and a to do list with the specific assignments I need to get done for that week and I use it religiously.  These techniques will help me tremendously throughout the next semester if I continue to utile them.    

Safari Blog #5 Sporting Event

For this week’s Safari event I went to the football along with almost every other student who attends SCSU.  Going to the game was more of a fun activity for me rather than an assignment.  Even though I’m not a die heart football fan I enjoy watching mostly any athletic event.  SCSU ended up losing 30 to 14, but it was still fun to go watch the half time shows and meet other people at the game.  Also I learned a little more about football than I had previously known which could come in handy one day.  Never the less I plan to attend the next home football game and any other sporting events on campus.        

Beating the Requirements

The first blog to grab my attention was Allison’s her title “Don’t be Delicate be Vast and Brilliant” intrigued me.  As I started to read through her blog it became clear that she knows how to articulate herself in a way that makes you want to keep reading.  The title of her blogs also makes a statement.  Using quotes as certain blog titles eludes you to believe that the blog post is going to be insightful and interesting.  Her pictures are simple, but relevant and fit nicely with each topic she presents.  I also like her background; it’s not over extravagant but not boring either.  In my non professional opinion Allison’s blog defiantly deserves an A.  Another blog that is A material would have to be Taylor Rispoli’s.  Her vocabulary is excellent and she sounds very sophisticated through her writing, which is an awesome skill to have in college.  Similar to Allison she has an out of the ordinary title, naturally attracting my eye.  Also after reading through most of my classmate’s blogs, the ones with the interesting titles are better and more fun to read.  Therefore I plan on changing mine. Taylor also attaches links at the bottom of her posts that are similar to that specific post.  This is something that goes above and beyond the requirements, and is helpful for doing extended research on the topic.  She’s also very creative with her pictures and layout making each post pleasant to look at.  Allison’s and Taylor’s blogs are similar in the respect that they are both interesting and well put together, but they are both different.  They both put their own creativity and voice in their blogs, which is exactly what were suppose to do.  All of my classmates blogs were good but Allison’s and Taylors were excellent, so I believe they both deserve A’s.     

Tricks Of The Trade

One of the major pieces of advice that has resonated with me the most over that past three weeks is get involved.  Being involved can make a huge difference in a wonderful or terrible college experience.  I plan to join the intermural dodge ball with a few girls that I met at orientation, but doing an activity together will make our friendship stronger.  Another piece of advice that’s been helpful is to make sure your professors know your face.  One of my orientation leaders told us that and I decided to take their advice and make sure all of my professors know who I am.  I did this by participating in class, emailing them if I came across any issues with a topic, and staying after class if I had a quick question.   However an aspect I don’t find useful is online practice problems.  For example for my math class what have a “my Math Lab” and its extra inline practice but for some reason it just confuses me.   After I’ve received the first couple grades in all my class I know what I am capable in each class, and I plan to stay on top of all my assignments and do them to the best of my abilities.  If I notice that I’m slipping or getting lazy I’m going to remind myself that I’m paying twenty two thousand dollars to get an education here and I have to make the most out of it.  Two of my personal goals for the year are to go to all my classes and get at least a B on all of my quizzes and exams.  On the other hand if I do get a C or have to miss a class because I’m sick or god forbid an emergency situation occurs, I won’t let that discourage me. Lastly another personal goal I have is to keep my GPA above a 3.2 the whole year.   

         

Safari Blog #18 Convocation

For this week’s Safari blog I decided to attend the New Student Convocation Introduction ceremony.  The ceremony took place in the Lyman Center, and was very well put together.  Throughout the ceremony the class representative from the graduating class of 2013 passed down the torture to the class of 2016 representatives.  This symbolized a tradition from one class to another, in hopes that our class would be just as successful.  The president of our university also took the time to welcome us again to campus and reassure us of all the opportunity’s and majors offered on campus.   I’m glad I went to this because it showed me what to aspire to be like during these next four years at southern.        

Overcoming Difficulties

When I was in 7^th grade my parents got a divorce, similar to many kids in my generation.  However when my parents got divorced my dad moved eight hours away, we had to move from our house to a condo and my older sister moved out at the age of eighteen.  This so far has been the hardest thing I’ve faced in my life.  Since my dad lived so far away we would only get to go see him in the summer, and for Christmas.  It took me two years to figure the best way to cope with it.  At first I took it out on my mom and blamed her, which was ridiculous because she’s the one that stayed and took care of my younger brother and I.  Three years after my dad moved I had a moment of self actualization. I realized that my mom didn’t deserve the way I was treating her, and that our situation wasn’t her fault.  After this moment I really focused on bettering myself. I started focusing on my school work, picked better friends and became a lot closer to my mom and brother.  Also I would exercise; I found that to be extremely therapeutic, most especially running.  Four years after my dad left he moved back to Connecticut.  Last summer my mom and my dad actually ended up getting remarried to each other.  Although this makes me happy and I’m so glad to see them happy again, my happiness doesn’t come from them or their actions it comes from within myself now.  The coping skills I developed at the age of twelve are still the same ones I use today. In some ways I’m thankful for everything that happened, because it taught me at a young age that when things go wrong it’s not the end of the world.  These skills won’t just help me in college, but for the rest of my life.  Everyone faces problems in their life whether in there; social, academic, personal, or family life how you deal with these problems defines who you are.

Strategies For Success

In the readings “Work Hard or Work Smart”, “The Myth of Multitasking” and “10,000 Hours for Success” they all make valid points about being successful and how to achieve success.  In article number one “Work Hard or Smart” written by Tom Weber he says “It is to work both hard and smart”.  I had never really thought of it like that.  I always just heard work hard and do your best, but never to work smart.  This concept is pretty eye opening to me because all my life my parents have both worked very hard, but never really progressed in their jobs.  Working smart can change this, finding new ways to do things and learning new technology can take some of the load off so you don’t have to work as hard.  Yet at the same time only working smart won’t get you as far as working smart and hard.  In the second article “The Myth of Multitasking” it explains that multitasking is viewed as a good thing in our culture but it’s actually not, “Dave Crenshaw argues that the most common kind of multitasking doesn't boost productivity—it slows you down”.  This quote is also a new concept to me because in my mind the more things you got done the better off you were.  Granted, if the work you were doing was of decent quality.  This article looks at multitasking from a business perspective, but applying it to my life I still find it to be true.  If you’re doing too many tasks at once you can’t give the proper attention to them all.  The last but not least article “10,000 Hours for Success” states that to be exceptionally successful at something you must dedicate 10,000 hours of your time to it, which is over a decade.   The writer of this article states “if you examine the greatest athletes, entrepreneurs, musicians and scientists you will notice they only emerged after spending at least three hours a day for ten years practicing.”  I agree with this statement, but disagree that someone who has spent 9,000 hours would be less successful.  Some people just have a natural talent for things and don’t have to work as hard as everyone else, most especially some athletes.  Looking at this article from a student’s point of view I see class isn’t just the only part that goes into learning, putting in the work outside of class is what will grantee success in that class.  Looking at all of these articles side by side they all give different strategies for success in all aspects of life, and I agree with all three and plan on implementing them to my own life.    

   

Safari Blog #7 Fitness Center

The fitness center is open Monday-Thursday 7am-10pm, Friday 7am-8pm, Saturday 9:30am-4:30pm, and Sunday 2pm-7pm.  There is about ten treadmills, four ellipticals, four stair steppers, a stretching room, an abdominal room and several ab and leg machines.  They also have free weights, benching bars and three bikes.  It costs sixty dollars a semester to work out there and it must be paid with your hoot loot card.  They offer several group classes two of which I’m very interesting in taking, zumba at 7:15pm Monday- Wednesday and kick boxing at 3:30 pm on Mondays.  I’m actually a member at the fitness center, so I’m defiantly going to sign up for the zumba and kick boxing class.  My first time in the fitness center I was very impressed with the quality of the machines and the amount.  It’s almost as nice as the gym I go to in my home town, and its defiantly worth the sixty dollars a semester.            

Thinking Creatively About Blogs

   

The links to the blogs in our class syllabus were really helpful; each blog I looked at made it more clear on how I was supposed to make mine.  Tagan’s kitchen has really cool pictures and an interesting layout that caught my eye.  She also put where she took the pictures, and roughly how long it takes to get there from a common city which happened to be New Haven.  Another quality about this blog that was helpful was the tool bar on the side with all of her other blog posts and there titles.  She also added other links to other blogs similar to hers.  Charlie’s productive flourishing blog was interesting because by watching his video I understood the full picture of what his blog was about.  Also the tool bar on the top helped me navigate his cite and blog very easily.  Rebecca’s pocket didn’t draw my attention as much as Charlie’s or Tagan’s most likely because she didn’t have as many pictures or a background layout.  After looking at all of these blogs I got a good idea of what makes up an interesting and appealing blog.  For example having pictures or a colored background, but also to be informative and not use it as a diary.  My goals on bloggers for this semester are to make my blog fun to look at and interesting to read.  I’m looking forward to mastering blogger because it will be another technology I’m familiar with, which can be helpful in my professional life.  Learning how to write with style and an interesting tone will be extremely helpful.  This will be a skill I carry throughout college and into the professional world.  Lastly reading my classmates’ blogs will also give me ideas for my own blog.  Such as different layouts out a different way to set the pictures up, technical things of that matter.            

Thinking About College

Let me start by saying I believe college is what you make of it.  Going to college can help you accomplish many things first and foremost your career goals, a chance to broaden your horizons and it helps you find out who you really are.  To me being in college means more responsibilities, being responsible enough to manage your time between class, work and friends.  Also being responsible enough to make the cognitive choice to be friends with people who will lift you up not drag you down.  Coming to Southern has really opened my eyes.  Within this first week I have become less judgmental and more accepting of people.  My goals for this year are to attend every single one of my classes and be well prepared for them.  Looking over the syllabuses for all of my classes I became anxious, but I realized the work load might seem overwhelming at first but it’s doable.  My first impression of my professors was that they all seemed like they cared a lot about the course and their students.  It’s relieving to know that if I need extra help its available for me.  The expectations I have for all my classes is I’ll get out what I put into them.  This is something my orientation leaders had told me and I found it to be very true.  Another helpful thing my orientation leaders told me was to buy the recommended and required books.  This is helpful especially in my Spanish class, because I bought the Spanish dictionary and a book of congregated and translated verbs.  Which I can already tell is going to be extremely helpful.  One of my main concerns with all my classes is not being familiar enough with the type of technology each teacher prefers.  I’m sure over time I’ll get use to each one and it will become second nature to me.  Lastly my aspirations for this year and for my whole college career are to do well in my class, and build strong friendships with people.