Learning as an on Going Process - Essay Example

7 December Assignment “To learn something new and live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong.” – Anonymous. Learning is anon going process that takes place throughout a person’s life. On never stops learning even if he takes no effort to try something new because a learning experiences include significant changes that provide growth and development to a person’s character. Even when one is sitting at home doing nothing, he may learn from that by having a revelation regarding his purpose in life or what he would like to put his time into, in order to lead a better lifestyle. Every situation or circumstance that a person is exposed to provides him with a platform to learn something new. From missing the morning bus and learning to be punctual to dealing with people and learning how to be cold and warm in different situations, everything gives people something to learn from. People usually post their efforts into learning something new in order to achieve a certain goal. For example, learning a new language might help a person in improving his skills and thus open up new horizons for him with regard to choosing a career option. Through this paper, I have attempted to underline the various goals that I have been able to achieve by very significant learning experiences that I have incurred during the course of my lifetime, and how the same has helped me in growing as an individual into a better person with more sensitivity towards society. A person can never stop learning something even when he consciously makes an effort not to. This is because even in such a situation, it is evident that he will understand something that will definitely help him later in life and thus, nothing is wasted. All time spent, even idly, teaches a man how to spend his time more responsibly so as to not regret the future. Every learning experience provides the individual to learn and achieve some goal or the other. For the purpose of listing down the learning experiences that I have had, I have also talked about the various goals aimed to achieve because they provide incentives to doing something, and have explained subsequently what these goal areas mean to me and how I have been able to achieve them with the learning experiences that I have had the opportunity to have. The first goal area focused on is engaged citizenship. Engaged citizenship refers to when as a member of society, one immerses him into work in order to be in touch with other members as well as provide them with the help that they need. For example, being a shop owner and interacting with people on a daily basis engage one engaged with other citizens in terms of his professional life. Helping out those in need like charities and orphanages also provides for engaged citizenship because it allows individuals to be engaged with others and help each other out by understanding the problems that others have. The second goal area is personal growth – this is simple to understand as every learning experience helps an individual to grow and develop from within. From spending time with older people at old age homes and teaching young children to read and write, personal growth within an individual will always be achieved as one understands the art of patience and even learns from others in the process. The third goal is self-directed learning as it involves learning by being a part of an experience. This goal assists an individual to put himself headfirst into a situation and think on his feet while trying to find a solution for the problem that he is in. In essence, it assists him to grow better while teaching himself rather than learning something from an external source. The fourth goal area being focused on is one’s career and education – learning experiences account for some of the best opportunities that a person has to improve himself and his life and these opportunities mold a person in such a manner that he can also apply the experiences that he has had to his professional life and therefore choose a career or shape his education according to what he wants. For example, teaching younger children provides a hearty experience to any individual and teaches him to deal with children with patience, sincerity, and honesty. Moreover, the experience will also help him to learn a great deal by the children too and this later can be transformed into his career as he may opt to go into teaching full time and make a difference in the lives of his students. Goal Area 1 For a year between 1997 and 1998 I was the youth program coordinator for ages 14 to 18 in the Baha’i Community of Albuquerque in New Mexico where a team of us designed and organized a community based after school program for helping high school students to pass their qualifying exams and tutor them to help the achieve their dreams better. What helped me was that I hail from the Baha’i faith and as a member of the community, one of the main tenets of the faith aims to inculcate the love for community service within an individual. Moreover, I was also part of a task that helped in creating a community based force for students to get part time jobs and gain work experience as well as help in social service projects which would help them not only have better college applications but also assist them in developing themselves. Prior to this in the year 1996-1997, I helped out by working at the NABI or Native American Baha’i Institute in Arizona – Navajo where my duties included housekeeping, cooking, becoming a secretarial assistant, as well as a science coordinator for students aged 14-18 years and children from ages 4-9 years in developing and implementing science camps. For two years till 1992, I was a volunteer at NABI where I entertained the guests and residents, helped them run small errands like helping them read their mail as well as coordinated social and cultural activities amongst them. All of this work helped me interact with a wide lot of people and helped me understand their needs as opposed to my personal wants. It thus assisted in better-engaged citizenship because I was constantly in touch with people and helping them out through social outreach programs. I volunteered by helping out at a soup kitchen called Shepherd’s Table Homeless Shelter in Maryland between the years 2006 and 2009. Here, my volunteer duties included serving food to those in need as well as sorting out the clothes that people gave as part of their donations to the shelter. I had to organize drives for the purpose of motivating people to donate clothing and help out the poor and then distribute the clothing among those in need. I was constantly engaged in working with other people and thus in close contact with others at all times. This high level of interaction helped me understand the problems of other people and assist me in helping them out. People that came to the shelter seeking solace did not even have access to basic amenities like food and clothing and thus I took it upon myself to provide them with the best of opportunities from the donations provided by people. Goal Area 2 In all the volunteer work experience that I have had I have learnt a great deal about growing personally. Personal growth is involved with any kind of learning experience that one has in his life. At NABI, I learnt how to take care of others and be more responsible in terms of helping others. I learnt how to cook for people, entertain them and their guests, as well as provide housekeeping services – all of which have made me more responsible if nothing. At the soup kitchen, I was able to talk to people and convince them to give food and clothing to the poor and thus motivate a large number of people into helping those in need and inculcating these values within them. Moreover, I was able to interact with other citizens some of whom were even helpful in providing me with excellent feedback regarding my volunteer work and how I could do it better. The experience also helped me in personally growing and opening my eyes to the problems that others suffer from. It helped me realize that some people do not even have access to basic amenities which is such a big issue and that as citizens of the nation, it is the job of those that are well off and have access to these amenities to fight for the rights of others so that they are able to live a substantial lifestyle. I have thus learnt so many things through these experiences that have helped me grow personally and I can use all of this in my life later when I am independently settled. Also, I can help my parents and children when they are in need and thus help them live a good and easy life. I have some documentation to provide credibility for the work that I have successfully completed in the form of feedback from NABI and letters of recommendation from my mother with whom I performed some of the services. While my tenure as the youth program coordinator, I was able to grow while helping the children learn and become something in their lives. While motivating them, I motivated myself. Moreover, I was exposed to many children that had the urge to learn something new and their ambitions were so wonderful to be an audience to. Watching their eagerness to achieve their dreams helped me grow as an individual and understand that nothing in life is impossible and that it is never too late to achieve one’s dream. Goal Area 3 The next goal area that I was able to cover well was the goal of self-directing because the volunteer work taught me little things that will help me later in life like cooking basic food. Moreover, I was able to talk to a number of different people, go door to door and convince them to help the poor. I was able to negotiate donations with a number of different people as well as help them understand the importance of giving to the lesser fortunate. Self-directive learning according to me refers to the learning that takes place by one self when thrust in different kinds of situations. In all the learning experiences that I have had, I was able to learn something or the other by myself. At NABI while housekeeping, I learnt the art of speaking to people as an employee as well as a co-resident and guest. As the youth coordinator, I was able to gradually learn the art of being patient with children and understanding their needs. I have been in the position that they were in and as a result I was able to help them better with making decisions regarding their career. I was able to counsel them and also improvise upon a number of the lesson plans that I made for them regarding their part time jobs as well as tutoring. All my learning experiences helped me in learning something or the other by myself – the people around me were merely an added bonus that gave me the opportunity of understanding the society. Therefore, I would like to state that from the teaching to the housekeeping, the traits that I learnt by myself in dealing with children and adults alike in various situations may be attributed to self-directed learning. Goal Area 4 Finally, volunteering at the soup kitchen and shelter helped me understand that whatever I do in life, I would like to contribute and give back to society. The career path that I take will not be something that interferes with the rights of poor people or leaves them in more misery. I would like to educate myself into becoming a sensitive human being towards the needs of others and set up some provisions for them to lead a better life. I would like to choose a career that helps me help people and not just earn money for myself. I have been exposed to meeting different kinds of people from all walks of life during my experiences at work, which has helped me understand that the goal in one’s life should be to help others rather than merely help oneself, especially if someone is capable of doing so. I would possibly like to have my own hotel someday because of all the experience that I have had in housekeeping services, entertaining guests, dealing with different kinds of people, as well as providing services like cooking and cleaning. I would like to have my own inn or hotel to run and help people have a good time while they are on vacation. At the same time, I would like to set aside a few rooms for poor people that do not have homes to live in and help them by providing them shelter and food at least till they can help themselves. Around the holiday seasons, I would like to help the poor and spread cheer. Another career option that I have is to teach people and become a mentor; I have dealt with children of all ages and would really like to help them in their schoolwork and tutor them if they need help with passing their subjects. I would like to help troubled school students realize their potential and achieve their dreams and help them instill hope in their lives. I would also like to set up a proper internship services if I continue in this line, where I am able to help students get internships at various workplaces and thus help them with securing possible jobs and having a good future. Helping others helps a person help himself and in the course of the same, I have realized a number of wonderful traits that I have in myself. I would thus like to go in for studying arts along with teaching courses and providing counseling services to children or hotel management in order to choose either of the career options for myself, in the future. Whatever I do, I would like to set up a charity which would aim to help those in need that do not have any basic amenities or even families to depend on. In doing so, I would essentially be helping young children get opportunities and old people live a comfortable lifestyle - thus providing them hope and who knows, the same might just provide them with an experience to remember and learn something from life. In conclusion, I have had various life experiences that have taught me a great deal not only about others in my life, but also about myself as compared to the rest of the society that we live in. I have learnt that various people have varied needs, which are not always fulfilled even though they might be essential to live life by. As an individual with access to all kinds of amenities and opportunities that help me live a comfortable life, I see it as my duty to help others. This is the biggest revelation that I have had through all the learning experiences that I have had the opportunity of inculcating within my life and I am very grateful for the same. Through this paper, I have attempted to thus underline the various goals that I have been able to achieve by very significant learning experiences that I have incurred during the course of my lifetime, and how the same has helped me in growing as an individual into a better person with more sensitivity towards society. I have been able to successfully cover all the four goal areas that are personal growth, engaged citizenship, career and education and self-directive learning. To summarize all the work experiences, I would like to state in brief that I have personally grown a great deal with all the work that I have done. I see it as an excellent sign to have grown in fields relating to interacting with people. I have always considered myself to not be a good speaker and thus this helped me gain confidence and open my eyes to dealing with many kinds of people. This art, I was able to learn by myself with practice by immersing myself in talking to both adults and children and thus I would term it as self-directive learning. Engaged citizenship has been the bulk of all the experiences that I have been lucky enough to have because of the high interaction levels among people. I will not consider myself to be a shy or introvert person anymore. I have been able to engage myself in knowing people as well as understating their needs and wishes. I have been able to understand the manner in which so many people with the lack of so many opportunities are still able to get by the day without complaining. Also, I would like to take this moment to thank my teachers who helped to influence me to get into volunteer work because of the wonderful people I have been able to meet and the contacts I was able to make with all my work. All these experiences thus has been four fold because they have assisted me in growing in all aspects of my life rather than being subject to only a single goal area. I have also had the opportunity of having various career options now open to me after all the work experience that I have gained. Moreover, so much experience along with proper documentation that I have in the form of recommendation letters and feedback from my employers will help me get excellent internships and jobs in good companies in the future after which I would like to start my own business of either the hotel or inn or teaching people and setting up a center for children with lack of opportunities to help them realize their dreams. Read More