Introduction
Hello and welcome to my mPOLs 2022 edition. This mPol will be slightly different from past editions due to the loss of more than half of my PLP classes. The fallen include Scimatics, Maker and PGP. That leaves us with only Humanities which is technically two classes, Socials and literary studies. Because of that unlike usual, I will be splitting humanities into two parts. Finally, I will be covering my chosen core competency.
Social Studies
So far the project we have done for social studies has not been my best. Despite that, I do think there are a few pieces of evidence that would show a glimmer of hope for my success in social studies. But before I get into that I think it’s just about time to delve into what I did over the past five months.
Think you can do better?
The first of our three projects “Think you can do better?” Gave us the driving question “How should we govern ourselves?”. To answer that question we had to complete Three main milestones Election reflection, Statement of intent, and finally the Press release. For a more in-depth look into each of the milestones feel free to take a look at my other blog post here. Reflecting on this project now I can see lots of issues and mistakes I make. I can also see a few successes. So now the question becomes why? What leads to my shortcomings and what leads to my successes? One mistake I made during this project was focusing on the less important and slacking off when it came to the more important. For example, I spent an absurd amount of time on the video then proceed to procrastinate and sloppily create my blog post. I think there are a few things that could be attributed to this failure to deliver. First of all, is my work ethic/time blocking. This is an issue since I often procrastinate on assignments leading to them feeling rushed and incomplete. Another issue that could be attributed to my shortcoming would be burnout. This often affects blog posts because they come at the end of the project. So often when we get to them I am tired and lack the motivation to get them done. This affects me since blog posts are a vital part of my learning as a PLP student. They are also vital in showing the teachers what I learned and my progress as a learner. On the other hand, a good example of something I did well in this project was the main part, the video. I think this is a good example of success in this project since with this assignment I tried to avoid procrastination and didn’t settle for the bare minimum. Because of the aforementioned reasons the final product ended up being something I was proud of. Overall my performance in this project left something to be desired and improvements to be made.
Manhattan Project²
The “Manhattan Project²” was in was similar and different from “Think you can do better?”. Their structure was similar in that it consisted of some learning than the main task then a blog post. However unlike in “Think you can do better?” this project was displayed at our winter exhibition of learning. This meant we had more pressure to make sure our final product was the best it could be as it would be on display. Along with this added pressure we also had to do more on this project. This included reading and writing reports on the book “Hiroshima” by John Hersey. So where did I improve and where did I fall short compared to the last project? To start with the positives I feel as though I did put more effort into the project especially when it comes to the exhibition. An example of this is the video I created for my group’s room in the exhibition. This demonstrates a willingness to go above and beyond for certain aspects of a project. Sadly I wish I didn’t have to say this but this also demonstrates a negative in my work ethic. That is my constant favouritism towards things I find more fun. An example of this was my willingness to go above and beyond when it came to my video but my constant lack of effort when it came to zettlekastens. The issue with zettlekastens for me (and I would like to preface that this is not meant as an excuse) is that I frankly find them very boring. Now, this does bring up a bigger issue, my lack of motivation to put effort into things that bore me. What is a solution to this problem? A possible solution could be giving myself some form of reward for doing the work I find less entertaining. This would help build better habits which would hopefully result in better performance on assignments. Now that I have discussed zettlekastens I should discuss the elephant in the room, my final response journal or should I say the lack of my final response journal. So what happened? The most basic explanation is that I was scared it wouldn’t be good enough so I never completed it. I am aware that sounds very counterintuitive since obviously handing in nothing is worse than handing in something subpar. The solution to this is the same as my solution to creating a higher quality of work. This solution is to improve my time blocking and to work on eliminating distractions in my work environments. This is because the more time and effort I put into my work the higher quality it will be and the higher quality the more confidence I will have in it. Overall like the last project this project had examples of where I put more effort into certain aspects whereas I was lacking on others. Overall I feel I showed little improvement from the last project to this project. (You can find my blog post about this project here.)
Literary Studies
Unlike with socials we have so far only had one project in literary studies (unless you count our current project). The project we did do however showed improvement in the effort I put into the assignments.
Sounds of Poetry
As stated in the intro this project sits in stark contrast to the past two as it is a demonstration of what I can accomplish when I put in the effort (although it is by no means perfect). The goal of this project was to create a playlist that represented us then to use the poetic techniques we had learned about to analyze those songs. Some things that could be attributed to my success in this project are fewer assignments, shorter length, starting assignments sooner than the night before. I’m sure just reading that list you can see the big contributor to my success, not doing all of my assignments the night before. The cause of this sudden shift in work ethics still puzzles me as I am not sure why it started. Now the issue becomes how can I keep it going. As always the answer comes down to better time management and lessening distractions in the workplace. On the time management side of things, it would be beneficial to set a specific amount of time to spend on each piece of homework because unlike past years grade 11 brings along a much heavier workload. For distraction, it would be beneficial to put my phone away and perhaps find some program that limits what I can do on my computer during designated work periods (although I am unsure if a program like that exists). Overall this project is a good example of improvements to my work but by no means makes up for past mistakes. (You can find my blog post about this project here.)
Core Competency
The core competency I chose for our latest project “Sounds of Poetry” was creative thinking. I specifically chose this competency because I felt as though it was something I could accomplish and that fit well with the project. I believe that I was able to accomplish this milestone. The best evidence to support this would be the analysis of my chosen songs. Despite that, I do think there is room to improve. This is because even though I feel as though I was able to creatively analyze my chosen songs I could have gone much more in-depth into the meaning behind the lyrics. I also could have taken a more creative approach when it came to identifying the poetic techniques used in the song. Overall I feel as though I have shown a close to if not accomplished demonstration of this competency and I hope to in the future demonstrate an exceeding demonstration of this competency.
Conclusion
Overall my performance over the past three projects has left lots to be desired. However, I do feel as though I have begun to show signs of improvement. The only thing left is to build on those skills and continue to improve.