The Creative Habit 1-3

Although the chapters are a little lengthy I found what she has been saying very interesting. Everything so far that she has said I have found interesting starting with how being creative isn't the easiest thing to do. I found it very interesting that she has basically described the process of creativity which I strongly agree with. I also like what she had to say about rituals I can really relate to believe rituals because I have a ritual every time I kick a football. I do the same thing not that I know it’s going to work but the thought that I’m going to make it happen because I am comfortable due to my ritual before I kick. I definitely found chapter two the most inspiring and relatable because I feel that rituals are very important.  During our class discussion I would definitely like to talk about creative thinking because I feel she was very opinionated on the whole creativity thing which I feel would be would start a good discussion in class. I would be very interested to see what people have to say about that chapter because of her theory of how basically everything happens because of creative thinking.

midterm grades

As midterm grades start to show up I realize I need to step up next semester. As of right now every midterm I have gotten back has been either a C-, a  C or C+  which is alright by me but not by my parents and my parents know me well enough to say that I should be getting B’s or higher. This makes me believe that I can do that therefore I will be trying much harder next semester to prove to them and myself that I am capable of getting the grades that they believe I can get. Performance wise for this semester I feel that I have been putting in a solid amount of effort but I definitely am not giving it my all which is why my grades are what they are.

The Rain Column

AS I walk through campus every day I pass by this giant piece of art work that lies in front of Engleman hall. I have always wondered what it is and getting this blog assignment encouraged me to find out more about it and what it really is. Well to begin, it’s called the Rain Column. This piece of art was designed by an artist named Mikyoung Kim. It is made of stainless steel which makes it almost impossible to get destroyed. What I like so much about this piece is that it is so strange and always makes me wonder what it is and I like pieces of art like that because sometimes it gives you the ability to think beyond just one specific thing. What I also know is I’m not the only one who thinks that. Whenever I ask people what they think it is, they either come up with a bizarre answer or are just clueless. The point of this piece is not only for show but it also has a role on campus. During a rain fall it captures the rain which can be used to measure how much rain we have had during the rain storm. It also shows a cool reflection in the captured water which gives it a cool look. After investigating and finding out more about this piece of art on campus I feel that I can know share the knowledge with people that also wondered what it is and the point of it.

Health Center

This past week I caught an awful sickness so I went to the health center. I later on remembered that going to the health center is a campus safari item. After struggling with a terrible cold I decided it was time to go to the health center hoping they would have a cure for me. When I stepped in I was asked to fill out a paper and some information about me along with my insurance. After this they asked me to fill out a sheet with what symptoms I was having. Once this was done the nurse at the desk gave a call into the doctor. The doctor told her he will take me in the next day at 8:25. After hearing this I was so happy to think that I will soon be better. the next day I woke up and headed over for my appointment after doing a bunch of tests he gave me some medicine called amoxicillin and robitussin and said "if you don’t feel better after taking this medicine for a week come back and see me." lucky enough I was feeling much better by the second day of taking it. I would have never known how helpful the health center could actually be for health and getting a campus safari item out of the way.

Take a break

This week for my blog assignment I choose to go and watch my two best friend’s flag football game. This was very stress reliving. It was really nice to go hang out with them on the sideline and see them play for once. With midterms going on and always being so busy with football and studying I never really have time to hang out with them so it felt really good to be hanging out and not worrying about my studies and my own football for once. Seeing them have a good time at college made me happy because I know it’s not always easy to get involved and meet other people but they seem to be doing just fine with both of those and having a great time at school to say the least. Taking some time off from midterm studying showed me that I really should do this more often not just this one time. After going out and having some fun with my best friends it showed me that I should do things like that more often and taking time off from studying once in a while isn’t a bad thing, it actually is a good thing to do because it takes a lot of stress off of you.

You must Believe to Achieve

At the end of summer I actually decided to write a list of goals I had for this semester I brought the list to school with me and look at it every weekend. I made two lists football and school goals. Unfortunately as the semester carried on I came to realize none of the goals I set had been reached and it’s actually started to really affect me in a bad way. As in feeling like giving up which has made things really hard for me. Some goals I had was getting at least a 3.0 or higher for the semester even though I haven’t gotten many grades back I don’t think I’m close to that. It’s not that I’m not putting in the effort because I am it’s more of me not knowing what’s due and what has to be done by a certain time. That’s what kills me. It’s tough not being told the homework assignments every night like in high school I personally think that’s the hardest thing for me is not knowing what’s due and when its due. The way im going to deal with these goals is carrying them on to next semester. Some times it’s good to make new goals but other times it’s good to keep the same ones. You’re not always going to achieve your goals the first time and the biggest thing is not giving up on them which is why I plan on keeping the same goals for the next semester. I believe that you should never let a goal slip away from you if you don’t achieve it the first time there’s always the next time and that how I plan on going into this second semester. Even if I don’t achieve the goals second semester it’s ok as long as there’s improvement from the first semester and eventually as I keep improving I will end up achieving the goals and once I achieve a goal it will feel great!

Pep Rally

This Thursday for my campus safari I attended the Pep Rally at the Moore Field House. It was quite the experience. They announced all the sports teams which was really cool because the football team was called out and we all walked out and some of the guys danced. Through out the Pep Rally they had the step team go out, and the dance team. Although these dance teams were very entertaining I found the most entertainment when each team had a player go out on the court and they had a dance off. This dance off was awesome I have never seen kids have such talented dance moves. Jay Holt a player on the football team easily had the best moves he ended up winning the entire dance off after ending his dance with a split causing him to tear his entire pants right in half. After his wardrobe malfunction was taken care of he was announced the winner and was gifted with a brand new Xbox 360. After all the teams were announced and the raffle was finished the Pep rally had come to an end.

Only you can hoose what you fail and what you dont

As I continue to read the mindset book failure continues to stay around within the reading. It is involved with both mindsets fixed and growth mindset and how it works with in each of them. The difference between the two is with growth mindset if you fail you’re more likely to keep trying and not give up. With fixed mindset you’re usually the one to stop trying and face the fact you just can’t do it like a dead end for example. For me I believe I have both mindsets depending on what the situation is. An example would be football and kicking. Kicking is not easy it might look it but it’s not. I have had many off days and have missed quite a few kicks and had a few bad kicks in my day but it has yet to stop me. Having bad days with kicking is what motivates me to do better and basically ignites a little man in my mind saying “hey this is a test to see if you can overcome this and get better from it”. Believe it or not it works for football and bad day for me isn’t a good thing but it helps me realize that there’s always room to get better and never give up. This is the growth mind set. An example of me also having the fixed mind set would be during a math problem. Math is very difficult for me I tend to give up a lot when I don’t understand something which is a very bad trait. During home work when there’s a problem I don’t understand I tend to just give up and face the fact I’ll never be able to do it. I do this sometimes even with entire assignments which is very bad because it affects my grade. It’s weird because as much as I don’t want to skip it and try to accomplish it, it’s almost as if my brain just shuts down and tells me to just stop you have no chance. So in my case of failure I think I carry both mindsets.

Expanding the Horizon

Something I’ve recently done that was outside of my comfort zone was I went to a frozen yogurt place. This was outside of my comfort zone because I normally don’t like yogurt but I was forced to try it. The place I went to was in Hamden called Froyo World. It happened to be amazing! The frozen yogurt is nothing like yogurt, it was more like soft serve ice cream which I love so obviously I loved the frozen yogurt. The coolest thing about frozen yogurt is there are tons of flavors and toppings to add. I choose snicker doodle froyo and put a giant assortment of toppings on it. I was a little worried I was going to over kill it with the topping but it turned out delicious. A few topping I put on it was marshmallows, graham crackers, chocolate chips and white chocolate chips and topped it off with chocolate syrup. Once I devoured my masterpiece of frozen yogurt I was happy to admit that the new thing I tried was something that I will be having a lot more often. Doing something that I wasn’t all for and went out of my comfort zone for was well worth it. This taught me that trying new things and expanding my horizons is something I should do more often because you never know what you can get out of it. Most of the time leaving your comfort zone is a good thing and it shows by my situation of trying frozen yogurt. By the way if you have not tried frozen yogurt yet I highly recommend you do but be careful its dangerously good.

Growth mindset vs Fixed mindset. What are you?!

The main argument of the book so far is whats the difference between growths mindset and fixed mindset. Personally I don’t really care about this argument but since the title of the book is called Mindset the argument seems pretty valid to me. Yesterday in class we discussed these two mindsets and debated on what the two meant , which was nature and nurture along with what type of motivation would they qualify as, intrinsic or extrinsic. AS a class we first defined these two mindsets in our own words. Growth mind set is the belief that basic qualities are things you can cultivate through effort. In other word you are willing to learn new things and take on challenges. Growth mind set is intrinsic motivation and more of nurture. After going over growth mindset we did the same with fixed mindset. We came to conclusion that fixed mindset is the belief that you have a fixed amount of ability and intelligence. Basically saying that what you know already is all you need to know basically limiting yourself to things and not expanding your own knowledge. Fixed mindset is an extrinsic motivation and  is a gene that you are born with. Some people can be one or the other and sometimes people can be both depending on how their mind works . Personally I think I have a growth mindset. I believe that if I work on things I can gain growth in them and get better as time goes on I am not one to give up and I have learned to be this by other I look up too.

Time Managment Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FspQrw07p7w&feature=g-upl

After completing my video project i believe it came out very good. I put in over 4 hours of work into it and i think the finished product came out great.Through out the time given i think i manged my time very well once the assignment was assigned i spent the first day deciding on what i wanted to base my project on and how i would ask my questions. After taking time to figure all that out i started interviewing random people, two staff members that are a part of SCSU three freshman students and one professor. Once i did all the planning and interviewing i started constructing my video. Due to my planning i feel this all worked out very well, the video is very clear informative and gets straight to the point which i feel is most important. After completing the project it is easy to come up with a conclusion to how all people had similar responses to the questions and helped me gained knowledge as well on how even though people have similar responses they also have different ways of putting it  which i think is the best part of this video.