It must be throwback Thursday because here I am, in grade 12 doing my first mPOL since all the way back in grade 9! For those of you who aren’t aware of the term mPOL it stands for a mid-year presentation of learning. In an mPOL, I the student, speak to my teacher and parents about my learning and evaluate my strengths and weaknesses as well as setting goals for how I plan to improve in the second half of the year. I may not be as cute as I was when presenting back in grade 8 and 9 but I can say that I am much more aware of who I am and how I can evaluate myself in a sophisticated way. At the beginning of the year I created a learning plan to outline my goals and growth I planned to work on and achieve over the course of my grade 12 year. I highlighted my strengths, room for growth, and ways to get support along with disposition, habits, and systems to make sure I accomplished what I wanted. I can say right now that I have not lived up to the standard I put in this learning plan and I know why, but more importantly I know how I can change that going forward into my final months of high school.

Strengths

Starting off on a high, in my learning plan I pointed out my strength of being a critical thinker who is always asking questions and looking to go deeper. In everything I learn I am always making connections to my life and current world, or as the teachers like to say, I constantly make “real world connections”. I am so passionately curious about the world I live in that I am always looking for answers as to why things are the way they are. So far in the year I exemplified this in the atomic bomb project, where I took the ideas being taught of about America’s rise of power and pride after the bomb and connected it to my knowledge of the Cold War I learned in grade 11, as well as relating it to my current thoughts on America today. My final product was a statement backed by my own argument, on which I had sources to back me up on. My brain (and zettelkasten) did the thinking and connecting needed to get a deep and critical understanding of the cause and effect that came from America dropping the atomic bomb in Hiroshima.

Growth

In the growth section I had three goals, all off which were somewhat misses. I wanted to take more creative risks on projects, which within the 3 projects we have done the product at the end has been decided for us so I couldn’t challenge myself that way. However, I have always shied away from art in general and actually believe my conceptual art piece was my best piece of work all year. That in itself shows growth that I can create good work even if it’s outside of my usual format. My next room for growth was to read more and grow my vocabulary which I have definitely FAILed in. Reading the Hiroshima book I had trouble staying up to date and finding deeper understanding and connection with it was very difficult for me. That was probably one of my weakest showings of work but I did learn a lot from it and over the three journal entries I believe I gained better skills in text analysis which I showed in my final theme analysis.

Response Journal Improvement

My final room for growth was to be less of a “bossy” leader in groups and to work with new people. I would say I achieved this within the political party project and in our exhibition groups. In both I didn’t initially take leadership roles but over the course of the project I slightly morphed into one, in a good way. Both groups had friendly and laid back feels to them and both were successful and strong in their goals (creating a campaign video and creating a themed room for exhibition).

Support

The support methods I listed in my growth plan included managing my time with a schedule and having regular check-ups with teachers. The first one I would say has gone to plan, I time block my schedule in the calendar app and I am always updating it and checking what I have on upcoming days. As someone with a very confusing schedule this is super important for me and now by grade 12 I have found a system that works well for me. The meetings with teachers have not been happening and that is on me. I need to be proactive and act on my words. So far in the school year I have struggled with motivation and many times I have wanted to speak to a teacher or councillor about finding solutions for this and I keep putting it off. In the remainder of the year I WILL take proactive steps to seek help when I need it on matters relating to schoolwork or anything. I cannot let things build up in my head and instead need to use the support given to me so I can succeed.

Disposition

One part of my disposition said I wanted to work on a style of leadership where instead of me overstepping and doing everything that doesn’t get done, I have strong communication and motivate group members to do their part. While I’d like to think I did work on this I definitely noticed in the exhibition setup groups that although I wasn’t a curator, on the night of exhibition I was leading the setup when we weren’t organized enough. I also took charge of the historical significance display, when I should have included more members and shared out the work in a more balanced way. I always end up being the person to pickup pieces when they don’t get done. If I continue this throughout post secondary and a career, I will be used and walked over; I need to work on motivating group members to do their part.

Historical Significance Display

Habits

In my learning plan I listed 4 different habits I would get into to improve myself as a learner. Unfortunately I have only successfully kept two of these going. I have continued time blocking my calendar in my phone and rely on this very heavily. I also have been turning my phone off or leaving it somewhere far while doing schoolwork to avoid distractions. These two habits have helped me get my work done on time and stay organized. The two habits I have not settled into is reading 30 minutes everyday and spending 20 minutes every night revising my zettelkasten. I haven’t been reading any books, but my hope is by taking English Literature 12 as a course I will get into this habit. As for my zettelkasten I have been making notes, mainly literature ones, however, I need to do this daily revision to turn them into permanent notes and make the connections. I keep them all in my head but with this short amount of time each day I can make it much easier for myself later on when it comes to needing evidence for arguments.

Some Literature Notes

Systems

For the most part the systems I put in place have been a success for me. I have a Trello board I use for all major grade 12 information and it was super helpful when going through the university application process. I also have been better at keeping on top of my email addresses, reading and clearing mail. Maintaining a healthy sleep schedule has been more challenging for me as someone who had a super full schedule last semester. This is something I have always struggled with but I know if I can figure it out I will be a much more productive student.

Core Competencies

Another part of the learning plan was selecting profiles in which I would be meeting each of the curricular competencies. I believe all of these should stay the same, I have not improved enough in any of them to move up a profile but I also have been meeting everything required for where I’m at. Last semester the competency I believe I was strongest in was my creative thinking where I proved I could “get new ideas in areas in which I have an interest and build my skills to make them work”. In all 3 projects I have demonstrated immense creativity and have brought lots of creative ideas together.

My Personal Feelings

This term was definitely not one of my strongest performances as a learner, in fact I’d probably consider it one of my weakest. Even from the first project, which had a subject matter I was super interested in, I never found myself be excited to work or excited to learn. This lack of motivation and work ethic continued throughout majority of the semester and it affected my work and deadlines. I hold myself to a very high standard when it comes to school and I was not meeting it in any of my classes.

I am now officially accepted into the University of Ottawa in the Communication and Sociology Joint Honours program and I want to finish high school on a high and prove to myself what I’m capable of. If I have a growth mindset and tell myself to succeed then I will and I will use all the habits and systems mentioned above. While last semester may not have been my greatest showing I am determined to make sure it only goes up from here. 📈