Graduation

This is my personal story. I decide to write about my 4 unforgettable experience at the University of Washington. I remember I got my acceptance letter at the University of Washington on March 2007. I was so excited, I couldnt believe it. Now here I am completing my Bachelor's degree in Early Child Family Study. My time at the University of Washington gave me the opportunity to grow in the early childhood profession and allowed me the opportunity for to work with children for 4 years. Prior to this I volunteered in Head Start program for a year. Head Start is a national program that promotes school readiness by enhancing the social and cognitive development of children through the provision of educational, health, nutritional, social and other services to enrolled children and families. This program gave me opportunities to expand and broaden my leadership skills. I also enjoyed working with a diverse group of people. I am very proud to work in this field and also committed to provide a quality learning environment for children.

observation

This week I am going to write about something which I noticed at my service learning cite last week. I volunteer at Child Haven which is a non profit organization which works with children who come from back grounds of abuse and neglect. Therefor many of these children need more attention and we are encouraged to hug them and hold them so they feel the closeness which they may be lacking with their family. We have a new sub since a employee is on vacation for a few months, and she refused to hold a child. To me it seemed like this child so badly wanted this sub's approval by being held, and the sub was rejecting her by turning her down. The child just got more and more upset crying to the point of coughing and the sub still would not budge. This really bothered me and was hard for me to watch I think it was really harsh for this sub to completely blow off this child's needs. The child is only 2 years old and needs that love from every staff member.

Motivation

Education is an essential part of me. The main reason my parents. My parents with three children, had decided to emigrate from South Korea to the United States was so that my siblings and I would have the best education possible. When I was only ten, I could not understand why she had to bring me to a foreign land where I could not even speak the language. Eleven years later, as a student at University of Washington, I thank her with all of my heart for the wisest decision she has made for me. I understand that I am fortunateto live in a place where education is highly valued. As for me, I embrace the privileges of high education available to me and would like to seize all the opportunities given to me. With the knowledge I have gained, I desire to live an exciting and joyous life with people I love. Then, I want to help many more to have hope and passion for life as I do. With that said, my parents motivate me to study harder in school. It is now my turn to pay them back for all the things they have done to me. I want to study harder in school and get a good job because my parents have sacrificed their life for me to go to school in the U.S.

Motivation

In high school I feel I most motivated when I played basketball. I strived to be the fastest and best on the team. All my time and energy went into running and playing basketball to be the best. I was motivated from within not from someone else, although you could say my peers motivated me because I wanted to be better than everyone else. Working hard payed off and nothing felt better for me then when I truly had a good game, which kept me motivated to keep working harder. I feel motivation is best when it comes from within and you don't do it because someone else wants it for you but because you want it for yourself.

Entry 8-Motivation

There are many things that motivate me in my life.  Throughout my education, my parents were the motivation behind working hard to get good grades.  They required me to be trying my hardest at all times and trying to get all As.  However, they did not punish me for not receiving all A's as long as I was putting forth the effort.  My initial motivation was to not be punished for not doing everything I could and try my hardest.  However, it turned to more of a self motivation. I was motivated to get all As in order to make them proud and get into a good college.  

I have a job outside of school.  When I got my first job, it was because my parents told me I could not get a car unless i could pay for my own gas and insurance.  Getting money and being able to have a car was my initial motivation in getting a keeping a job.  Now the reason I keep a job is because, yes i am still motivated by the money, but now I am also motivated by maintaining a good resume and to be able to network.  

Finally, i am motivated to play basketball.  I played throughout high school and then quit my senior year.  However, I have been motivated to continue to play recreationally by the fact that it  keeps me active and it is something I love doing and want to continue to improve on for my self, even though I don't play on a team anymore.

Entry 7- Intelligence

I work at Oakley, a retail store that sells high end sunglasses and beach and snow outerwear. I am a manager at my store and have been working and gaining knowledge about Oakley products for three and a half years now.  The products have a lot of technology and there are many different styles of sunglasses and lenses for a variety of activities. Over the weekend, I was helping a customer who was joining the military looking for about which sunglasses would be best overseas. I was talking to him, teaching him all about the different technology and which styles would be best and why when he responded with, "wow, how do you know all of this stuff? you're so smart".  In this instance, I believe what he meant by smart was I have a lot of knowledge and information about the products and that I was doing a good job of relaying my knowledge to him.   

I also asked my parents this weekend what they believed being smart or intelligent meant.  My mom responded saying that being smart meant working hard and producing correct answers.  She said it was not being lazy and doing everything possible to show results.  My dad believes intelligence is something you're born with.  Initially he said that smart people are "wired smart" and have the capacity to learn things quickly.

Entry 6

I have been involved in many adult-run learning environments in my life.  All throughout my education in public schools from Kindergarten through 12th grade, every classroom was adult run.  The teachers were always the one's to design lesson plans and activities and had complete control of the kind of learning that went on in the classrooms.  I don't believe this is bad at all, I feel like i had a great upbringing and education.

Although I have never participated in a child-run environment, I am taking a curriculum class that focuses on different approaches to learning and types of curriculum.  Many of these curriculums consider the activities that the children want to be participating in, and they essentially design their own lesson plans, they have a lot more control over their own learning. 

I believe that children run environments are good and beneficial, however, I think their needs to be a balance of adult-run and child-run situations in the classroom.  Without teachers and teacher-run classrooms, children would not learn nearly as much.  On the other hand, it is important for students to have choices and experiences that they can decide on in order to help them grow