What I Have Learned Since the Beginning of the Semester - Personal Statement Example

Ever since the semester began, I have learned many things. For instance, I can now write an essay using the correct format by following the academic rules. I am now familiar with the controversial topics such as politics, general information of a country. I can now formulate a well-articulated presentation while in class. Life skills education is one of the most valuable lessons that have learned during the semester. I must admit it takes time since learning is a lifelong process. I believe that life skills education is beneficial to me as it helped me become familiar with the practical skills required in daily life. I also earnt how to write well, how to work well within the contrast time, and how to work as a team while doing class assignments. The skills acquired from this class have improved my performance not only in this class but also in other courses. I am so happy that I signed up for this class.

One of the many skills that I have learned in class is presentation skills. I understand that public speaking and presentation skills are essential both in academic and other careers. A capacity to convey ideas with clarity and confidence is very crucial when articulating any presentations. I learned that to become a great public speaker, and I have to plan before the main presentation and write the keynotes. Planning before presentation prepared them for any interruptions and interrogations that may arise while doing the presentations.

For this reason, one should rehearse many times without memorizing the speech. I learned that to be successful in my remarks; I need to create bullet points for all the key ideas included in the presentations. I also learned that practicing before the main speech helps one speak naturally, manage stage anxiety, and change the tone to convince the audience. I used to be bad at body language. At the same time, presentation, but after lessons, I learned that body language such as making eye contact, standing up straight, and avoiding gestures helps capture the people's attention.

With this in mind, I believe in becoming a better speaker, and I need to improve my engagement with the audience. This could be informed of questions, getting their feedback, and incorporating their comments when illustrating a certain point. I also learned that I could keep the audience engaged; I need to show them some video clips and engaging them throughout the entire time. By engaging the audience captures their attention, thus making public speaking success. Another crucial thing in public speaking is dressing appropriately, which makes someone feel more confident, thus making the audience more receptive to what I tell them. Without learning the public speaking lessons taught in class, I would still be a poor public speaker.

Politics has not always been my cup of tea. However, the lessons taught in class made politics more interesting. The experiences helped me understand the connection between politics and religious beliefs. For instance, political ideology has a significant influence on religion. Sometimes politics would influence people to turn away from God, and it would also change people to come closer to God. This means that politics have both positive and negative influences on how people relate to God. I believe some political ideologies positively influence the propagation of the gospel as some clergymen are part of the decision-makers. For instance, some religions such as Roman Catholics are more attenuated to democracy than others that strictly forbid their followers indulging in politics. The involvement of the church into politics has led to some changes in the parliament, which are Christian related. It also helps the followers of the church to engage in voting for the right leaders. I learned that politics influences the government to construct more churches where people can worship. This is because the right to worship is encouraged in all democratic countries.

On the other hand, political ideologies have a negative influence on churches. For instance, I believe some people use the church for their malicious acts and their gain. As a result, the ideologies formulated a claim that the church is the most corrupt institution and business. This makes believers lose their faith in the church and become non-believers. It is for this reason that church and politics have made an effort to undermine each other. This lesson was vital as it helped understand the connection between church and political ideologies.

I used to be fond of writing my essays by using slang language. The lesson taught in class helped me understand that using slang language in academic writing is forbidden as it makes writing sound informal. I learned that academic writing is vital as it makes writing formal and helps in avoiding using forbidden language. Using official language helps in conveying particular ideas to the reader as precisely as possible. I believe that using slang language makes writing vague, ambiguous thus confusing the readers more. It also compromised the strength of writing since slang is localized to a particular area. I also think those slang losses meaning after some years as it evolves quickly. Before, I would use words such as kids, don’t flex or ragged off to mean steal whenever I was writing my essays. After learning the importance of avoiding using sang language, I writing has dramatically improved. I understand that articles are written using slang language and have grammatical errors often display the wrong impression to the reader. Well, I admit switching from informal writing to formal writing has not been an easy task for me. It needed dedication, time, and reading multiple books to gain knowledge.

The readings from the course have also made me familiar with the basic concepts of writing. For instance, I can format my paper in APA, MLA, Chicago, and other formatting styles. At the beginning of the semesters, I did not understand much about the rules of academic writings. For this reason, I only submitted my assignments in any format. I often got bad grades, as I always made the same mistakes while formatting my paper. Reading the course materials, helped me understand that formatting an essay makes it readable and improves its consistency. I also learned that I need to arrange it in chronological order for my story to be interesting. Arranging the story in a chronological order improves the tone and the flow of the paper. It also enhances the communication between the reader and the writer.

The course readings have also taught me to adopt good study habits. At the beginning of the semester, I had lousy study habits such as cramming before the main exam, not asking questions, not doing any research, and distractions while studying, among many others. For instance, I could cram a whole handout the night before the main exam. I did this as I was too lazy even to read some course materials. However, through the course materials, I have developed good study habits. For instance, I am organized, joined a study group, a good team player, and have designed a study plan. Now, I can breeze through school activities with ease. Nowadays, I am working to develop my study habits and see that my grades improve.

I also learned that critical thinking is profound that has been developing for years. For instance, in cases where there is fake news, critical thinking is crucial. Lacking essential skills of thinking means that one cannot process and analyze any information. Through the course readings, I learned that developing critical thinking skills is objective and takes time. Having the creative thinking skills have helped me develop persuasive arguments while writing my essays. For instance, I am able to incorporate facts and figures in my writing correctly and cite them. It has also helped me develop an eye for sources that have incorrect information. It has helped me realize that not all information given by the sources are correct. It has helped me think outside the box, has enhanced my language and helps me think before I act. I am happy as my grades have improved and am now able to concentrate in class. Therefore, I recommend our course instructor for the commendable job as I am now a better writer than I was before.