Sunday, November 25, 2012

Get Orgainzed

To "get organized," I am cleaning my room. My clothes need to be hung up in my closet, books need to be put away, and some stuff needs to be thrown out. I am doing this by myself.

I haven't started cleaning yet, and I keep finding excuses not to do it. I get distracted by Facebook, music, or my phone. It's just a daunting task that I'd rather not be doing, so I find myself doing other things. I know that once I finally clean it, though, I'll feel much better.

I'm about halfway through cleaning my room and I cannot focus for the life of me. I keep finding different reasons to stop; I think of a random question for my mom, my cat walks in the room and I have to pet her, I want to skip the song that comes on, etc. I am just so bored.

I finally finished cleaning my room and I feel extremely accomplished. Even though it took much longer than it should've, I still got it clean and it looks amazing. I feel much less overwhelmed now.

Before I cleaned my room, my mind was very scattered. When I would look for something, I had to look at the floor because I would just leave random things there. Now I know where to look and my mind feels much more at ease.

After this project and analyzing my thought process, I found that I avoid doing something that I don't want to do as much as I can. I kept making excuses to put it off, even during the cleaning process. I realized that I do this with homework as well. If there's something I don't want to do, I put it off until the last minute, and that is a very bad habit to have. I'm now trying to change my mindset and realize that the sooner I do something that I don't want to do, the sooner it's over with and I can move on to more enjoyable things.

Sunday, November 4, 2012

Metacognition: Early Modern Project

I believe that I'm generally a good thinker. I take the time to think about each decision I make instead of just quickly choosing the first one that pops into my head, which I believe is a good quality to have. I sometimes go overboard with this, though, and tend to over-analyze things, which isn't a good thing. I then over think each of my options and it turns into a mess. I also get overwhelmed easily so I become very stressed out. I'm somewhat of a spaz, so this definitely adds to the stressed out or frantic feeling I get. I'd like to learn how to stay level-headed and calm while making a decision, I think that would help me keep from becoming stressed.

I do like the fact that I take the time to think about each option I have when I don't over do it. I know a lot of people that make rash decisions and it usually doesn't turn out well. I believe that I usually make good decisions, mainly because I take the time to think.

Something I don't like about my thinking is that I have a hard time trusting others when working in a group. For example, during our social studies Early Modern Era project, I got extremely stressed out because I didn't believe that the others would finish their work on time. We did get it done, but I need to learn to trust my group members. They want a good grade too, so why would they hurt their own grade just because it's group work? I can tell myself to be confident in them, I just have to start doing that.

What surprises me about my thinking is how I can pick out different themes or techniques in poetry. I've never been a huge fan of poetry; I never really took the time to analyze the art of it. But once we were pointed out different techniques the poets use throughout their poems, I was amazed on how easily I could pick up on it. It's like a whole new world was opened to me. Once we were shown techniques that Shakespeare used, I could easily find those throughout King Lear as well. I also have begun noticing these techniques in other things such as shows or movies. I was watching Blazing Saddles the other day and I saw an example of the back-and-forth dialogue that Shakespeare used in his writing. I can easily pick up on different writing techniques, a talent I wasn't aware of until this year.

Overall, I think that I have a good thought process. Although sometimes I think too much, I believe that I do a good job of judging my options and making decisions. I also need to learn to trust my group members, but that's just a small adjustment that I can work on. Other than that, I believe that I can think logically, which is a good quality to have.