FLOW

   In our previous classes we talked about flow according to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. In the flow, one is highly focused and not easily distracted. One tends to have an overall sense of satisfaction due to a balance of challenge and skill which ultimately leads to mastery.

Today I believe I may have reached the stage of being in, "flow." I went to the library around noon today and I started revising my notes for one of my materials science classes. I got bored mid-way so I decided to take a 5 minute break and then go back to that subject. I kept looking to see how many pages I had left to read in the required sections. However once I started my biomaterials homework, I actually went into flow. I completely forgot time existed as I began searching for information on skin grafts and the effect of chondrotin sulfate as a major contributor to the surrounding dermis as a glycosaminoglycan. I effortlessly read countless of websites about wound healing and the stages of a burn. I wasn't even tempted to check my phone for a text message. Nevertheless, it wasn't until my stomach started rumbling did I realize I was hungry and I had been working on biomaterials for 3 hours straight. I was amazed at how much work that I had accomplished in what seemed only an hour of my time. It was as if it was only myself, my Dell laptop, and my notebook existed for that given amount time. I didn't even realize that the music from my Pandora station had stopped playing because I had been listening to it for so long. Being in the flow further confirmed how I want to go into implants and prosthetics. I hope I can get into this flow state for my other classes, especially before my finals start.

Also, there is a really cool app game called flow which I highly recommend to anybody who wants to spend some down time during exams.

T Minus 1.5 Weeks

Finals are almost here!
AHHHH EEEEECCCK OHH NOO WATCH OUT BEWARE THEY"RE GONNA COME FIND YOU

  So I don't know about you, but finals are coming a lot closer than it seems. Today, as I was planning out my schedule for exams it really hit me that they are almost here. Its time for late nights in the library where the only people you see are the people who are working around you and the delivery driver. Clemmons is full of people decked out in pajama bottoms with bags so large and dark it appears as though they are raccoons  Nevertheless, I've decided that this time around I'm going to be more prepared in how and when I study. Normally I have had the mentality of staying up late to study and waking up around 10 or 11 AM  to commence studying again. However, this time I plan on getting at least 8 hours of sleep each night. This will definitely be a challenging goal since I already have one of my goals this semester to be in bed by 1 AM each night. Yet, going to bed early won't be as bad as it seems. Not only will I feel rested, but I will also find a great seat in the library and maybe even a parking spot where I won't get towed!
  Another way that I plan to change the way that I study is utilizing the 5 day plan to study for my finals. I've already started using it for my tests and its made a difference in my preparedness for my tests. I don't feel as stressed out anymore and the notion of cramming the night before has slowly decreased. I still feel nervous before my tests, but I don't freak out when someone mentions a term or phrase that I don't recall studying before.
  The last and probably one of the hardest things that I plan on changing as I study for these exams is no music. I normally listen to music as I study which has lead to good and bad results. Music helps me tune everything else around me out as I concentrate on what is at hand. My mother is the youngest of 10 kids, so noise is apart of my daily childhood. All through high school I did homework while babysitting children ages 2-15. Thus noise almost gives me an at home vibe while doing work. However, I've found out that when I study without noise I feel as though I am able to get more things done. I feel less distracted and I don't feel as though time is slipping away. So hopefully this no music thing will not only mimic the environment for the test which will help with the association concept, but I won't blow out my eardrums at the same time.

Finals you are the weakest link...Goodbye

I Believe in Office Hours

 So on the last day of class before Thanksgiving break, my materials science (structure and defects) professor announced that if we wanted to know our current status in his class that all we had to do was email him. Immediately I thought oh my goodness this is going to be a can of worms or even worse the mother of all messes. Now I tried to think optimistic, but it takes 8 people including myself to accomplish his weekly homework. In addition, I did not to as well as I would like to on the tests for this class. On the second test, two people in the class received 100's and one person received a 102..There were 3 bonus questions on the test. Nevertheless, I was dreading emailing him all break about asking my status in his class. I would always get nervous about emailing a teacher because you never know how they are going to take an email. What you may consider sincere may feel like a hate crime to them. Yet I finally put all my anxious feelings aside and sent him the email on Wednesday.
 I finally received a response from my professor Monday afternoon and to my surprise I wasn't doing as horribly as I thought. My professor mentioned that I have a pleasant demeanor and that he has noticed me in office hours. I was excited just to know that he has noticed me in office hours. In addition, he stated that my current grade is in the C+ range. I did a large fist pump to the air once I read this comment and I almost fell out of my chair when I read that he would raise my grade 1/3 a letter grade if I improved significantly on the final exam. I called my mother because I couldn't believe the news I had read. Even now, I still can't believe that those very words actually formed and came out of my professor's mouth. I've heard stories about how students have been able to get their grades raised after solely talking to a teacher. I myself thought this is only a thing that happens to kids in the college where pleading with the professor can raise the grade on a paper. Whereas in engineering school, you can't talk your way as to why you put that the vertical asymptote was -1 instead of from the positive side it approaches negative infinity.
  All in all, office hours are not as dreadful as they seem. It does take time getting used to, but having one of my goals to attend office hours really made a difference. It may not make a large difference like it has for this class. Nevertheless, I do believe in office hours as a necessity for academic achievement.

A New College

  In class on Tuesday we received an article titled, Why we have college by Louis Menand of The New Yorker. I myself do not read magazines often, yet this was an unique article about why we need college and its purpose. Menand mentioned two different theories about college, 1 and 2. Theory 1 took an extrinsic take, where Motivation 2.0 prevailed with grades and a sorting process of achievement. Theory 2 was fueled with intrinsic motivation, Motivation 3.0, and a need for democracy. What really stuck with me in this article didn't come up until page 7 when Menand mentions,

" the system has become too big and too heterogeneous to work equally well for all who are in it. "

  This reminded me of one day in my biomaterials class when we had an open discussion about the educational system. We were given the prompt of if we could change the system in any way or form, how would we. One of the most unique ways that we talked about was a class where we had the option of how we wanted to learn the class. For a single class you could pick how you wanted to hear the material: in a lecture, through a lab, or a hands on activity. Of course some classes would be harder to offer in a lab version, yet the overall concensus was that everybody learns different and confining someone to a particular learning modality isn't the best. We also agreed that college should decrease its focus on grades and try to make majors and minors with more interdisciplinary with concentrations.
 Some schools are already trying to change how the entire concept of the classroom experience. Our professor mentioned how our biotransport class next semester may be taught in one of these new learning styles. The professor would post the lecture online the night before and it would be the students job to listen and take notes. This way, class would be more of a review session of any questions we had about the lecture and homework problems. I am hesitant, yet very intrigued about how this class will be next year.
  Nevertheless, I highly believe that the educational system should be changed. Yet, it is also my responsibility to keep up to date with the current system until it is finally changed. I know for myself, I had a difficult time learning to read. My mother made me switch schools because my first grade teacher was teaching whole words instead of phonetics. It was her first year teaching school, yet there are several children like myself who may learn differently yet do not have parents as active enough to make sure they get the help they need. Teaching is a very difficult profession and in some instances it ends up in babysitting the child for six hours a day. I only hope that education eventually gets the attention it needs.

Let Them Eat Cupcakes

 This weekend I celebrated Thanksgiving with my bridge class. Bridge is a transition program for incoming first years at the University majoring in STEM fields. It was an intense 6 week program where I took calculus 1, STS ("english" for engineers), and chemistry 1 lab. Nevertheless, each Thanksgiving we have a potluck where we all just sit around and think about the good old days of first year. For some odd reason, the whole concept of if you want to eat, you have to bring something besides an appetite has not yet been understood by everybody.. This time for the potluck, I decided to make cupcakes. However, these were no ordinary cupcakes. These cupcakes were homemade, not from a box, made from scratch red velvet cupcakes died orange for Thanksgiving. They were decorated with a homemade cream cheese frosting that has been known to make people's jaws drop at first taste. 
  Now, its been a while since I've actually been able to bake. I think the pressure of doing well this semester in order to get an internship has been a constant buoy in the back of my mind. I've changed a lot of things since last semester in order to achieve this, "academic bliss" that people seem to have. Even though I've changed things, like not going out to parties as much and going to office hours sometimes it feels as though I've lost a little part of me. My friends say they don't see me as much because I'm never home or at a meeting someplace. Even my roommates would text me asking if I was still alive because they hadn't seen me. I thought maybe I had changed into this out of control always doing schoolwork monster type of a person.   That I had become, "that person"  who did homework on Fridays when I had no class on
Fridays. 
  Yet as I continued to ponder this theory, I started to realize that even though I had changed my study and work habits that I was still the same person. I still make the best homemade cupcakes around these parts of Charlottesville and I know how to start a good laugh. Even though its been a couple months since I've baked, I still know how to bake. I used to think that after taking this class that I would be this completely changed person from head to toe. I would be all about academics an nothing else. Yet I'm still me at the very end of the day no matter if I've had 2 or 10 hours of sleep that night. My work habits may have changed, but hopefully so will my grades as well.

So all in all, Let them eat cupcakes

Television at its Best

  As one of my study breaks today, I decided to watch some television. Normally I will watch Food Network and pray that an episode of Cupcake Wars or Paula Deen is on. However today I decided to feed my inner child and watch some cartoons. Spongebob bores me so all that was left was Avatar: the last Air Bender or Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide. I chose Ned's Declassified thinking maybe I might learn something that I could apply to my overall college experience. The episode was pretty boring honestly. Ned's Declassified is about the main character named Ned Bigby and his overall experience in middle school. He has two friends, one named Cookie - I don't know his real name- and the other is named Mosley. Ned is like your average middle school student, Cookie is the extreme nerd of the bunch, and Mosley is the athletic all-around girl. On the show, they encounter cliche scenarios from when you have a crush on someone, to cliques, to bullies.

 The episode that I watched dealt with popularity and teachers. On the popularity part I zoned out a bit, yet I put forth some interest in the teacher portion. Ned and the gang moved up another grade so they were nervous about their new teachers. Mosley especially was nervous about one particular teacher because she had heard many rumors about how mean she was. On the other hand, the teacher had heard several rumors about how smart Mosley was and the fact that she was very gifted in everything she does. So both the teacher and Mosley came into the class with their preconceived notions about the other person and it was a disaster. Each person ended up disliking the other, when they knew nothing about each other. However, in the end they finally addressed what they had heard about the other person and they resolved everything.
  Now, I know the show is cheesy yet it had a good message about pre-judging people. I know sometimes I put my teachers in a box as if that is all they are capable of doing, is solely teaching. Its like when you first saw your high school teacher out at the mall. You didn't really want to say hello to them, yet your parents were always the first to point out, "Oh, isn't that...." My mother was a master at doing this to me and then I'd awkwardly stand and listen to my mother and my teacher converse. Why do we put teachers in these boxes? If we have put teachers in boxes, I'm sure that they have thought the same thing about us students. Its not like we mean to do this, but if everyone says Professor Brown is mean then most likely we will assume he/she is without forming an opinion for ourselves. Keeping an open mindset has been a juggle for me to keep while deciding on which classes to take. Course forum gives a pretty good description of professors, yet I need to make my own opinions as well. If only there was an individualized course forum on life would things be different.

I'm just saying, YOU can do better

  Something that I can improve on in my class is spending more time in my classes that I care least about. For instance, my biomaterials class I do not mind spending hours looking up relevant information for my class. I actually enjoy the idea of being a detective and trying to find what's the newest improvement for guglielmi detachable coil (GDC) therapy. Yet, for my structure and defects class, I have a hard time giving my undivided full attention for the 75 minute class. I do take notes, but I sometimes feel as though I am physically in the class but not mentally.
  With that stated, I really need to do better for this class. My first test grade wasn't so well but I have another test coming up this week and I pray that I do a lot better this time around. In class we talked a lot about editing and revising which is probably what I'll do to help prepare for this test in addition to making a giant study guide. I just hope the study guide is enough to last me through this exam and some of the final as well. Along with that I want to really engage myself not only in the class, but in the material as well. This can extend to finding and making friends in the class to go over the material with. I already do this is some of my classes, yet it is mostly about things that pertain to homework. If I try to open up the avenue to include basic studying as well then maybe everything should be okay.
  Another thing that I can improve on in my classes is doodling. When I get bored or uninterested in any of my classes, I tend to doodle. I look for an object or something interesting and I begin drawing away like I'm Pablo Picasso. In almost every corner or half page of my notebooks, I find some ornate pattern or a random diagram of a hand. I really need to work on finding some way to stay interested, but I almost feel as though I'm torn between the better of two evils- sleeping in class or drawing. On another note, I've actually become pretty good at drawing. Maybe I should try to take an art class next semester so I can rid myself of any desire to draw during class? I do have one more HSS elective class so maybe that will be my stress reliever class to all of my other classes next semester. Who would've thought a mere question of what can you improve on would lead to all of these suggestions. One more step in the right direction, I do believe so.