The Assembly

Unfortunately I was not able  to see Ms. Sotomayor speak at Southern on Monday. However when reading the book and seeing some recorded clips from Monday I got a sense of the type of women she is. A very respectable woman who fought an uphill battle and came a long way from her younger days. Although she struggled early in her life, she preserved through poverty and diabetes. She has been through a lot to become a member of the supreme court. One thing I respect about her is her love and respect for her mother regardless of her childhood struggles she still shows love and appreciation for the lady who created her. She stayed positive and believed in herself through all of the ups and down. Anything is possible when you believe in yourself and have a strong-willed heart.

Reality Check

 As the weeks pile up, here we are already passed the midterm mark in the semester. I was in awe when I found out that there were midterm grades already, I did not expect it to come in that fast. I realized quickly that you must stay on  top of your workload from the beginning and not fall behind. That's why you must manage your time wisely and use good judgment with your decision making.

I would say I am in the lower to middle range of where I intended to be at. I only have but so much time left to change that, so it was important of me to make an epic change in the way I did things on a daily basis. First of all, it is important to develop time management skills and apply them to your homework and studying time. It is critical to put time into getting the work done. Not only do you have to spend large amounts of time into homework, but also for studying. Especially when studying for midterms and  finals that effect your grade tremendously, it may require hours of review for you to feel confident for your exams.

I was glad that I was doing good in my economics and media class. I'm glad to see my hard work is reflecting in some of my classes and just motivation to keep getting them all up. I have faith that will time and repetition I will master the preparation tactics I need in order to have good grades in all of my classes. It will not be easy but nothing worth having comes easy. It's all about pushing yourself to be the best you can be at everything you do. Nothing is more important then your image and how you are remembered. I have to apply myself on and off the field because I also understand that I will not being playing football forever and life will still be here staring me in the face. In order to have a good job in a respectable field you must have good grades to show and that's why I will not be satisfied until I meet my high goals.

Vocabulary of the Week

 Critical thinking is discipline thinking that is open minded, rational, and informed by evidence. There is a lot of different things that involve critical thinking and making the best decision possible. The decisions you make at any point in your life can effect you for a lifetime depending on how serious of a situation you find yourself in. That's why it is always good evaluate your situation and surroundings and make sure you are doing what's best for you in the long run.

When you are analyzing something, you must be extra careful. To analyze is when you examine critically in detail in order to identify key causes, factors , and possible results. If you are a good analyzer you will notice a lot about your surroundings and how to always keep yourself in a good position with your life. It is always the  people who don't pay attention and care about what they do that get hit with the drama when they least expect it. It is always better to be safe then sorry, stay aware.

One thing that can't be taught is good improvising skills. To improvise, is to perform, deliver , or compose without preparation. Sometimes life catches you off guard and then it is up to you to roll with punches the right way and keep your composure. You must use old experiences for help on dealing with what is thrown at you, the way you handle it can sometimes benefit you and teach lessons for the future.

Thinking Critically

To me, critical thinking is important because of the fact that it is a lethal skill that can make or break you at times. The more mature and organized you are, the easier it should be to make tough decisions based off of instincts and prior experiences. Critical thinking is being able to form reasoned conclusions based on a process of reasoning and common sense. Over the past couple weeks I have definitely learned a lot about the critical thinking process and how beneficial it truly is.
The first step to thinking critically is analyzing the situation you are. If you are not where you need to be or feel like you are continuously under achieving your goals, you should reevaluate your priorities and habits that are taking away from your success. Honestly, you must always think about the consequences of what your actions can lead to and make the right decision based on your feelings toward that. The more caution and responsibility you take on with your life, the more you will automatically critically think because you want the best outcomes for your life. If your life is worth living, you must make sure you care about being the best person you could be and making good decisions that will eventually lead on a path to success.

For the brief time that I have been at college, I have realized that critical thinking is a necessity out here. here is a lot of responsibility that comes with being a student athlete and while being on a semi-large campus there can be some distractions that can steer me off course. It is important that you stay focused and on top of priorities before you do anything else with your time. Time management is another area of critical thinking that can be a big help with doing your work and managing your time to the  best of your ability. There is a famous quote saying " If you don't have a plan then your plan must be to fail." This basically means that if you haven't thought about goals and plans to succeed life that you're basically on a way toward failure since you have no direction or guidance. Critical thinking can take you far in life as long as you listen to what your conscience and reasoned experience tell you to do.

Critical thinking is a skill that you are not born with. You must develop this skill over time with maturity and learning from prior experiences. As long as you think before you act and use your best judgment tactics you will probably see a lot of success and  good effects thanks to your smart decisions.

Blog B

Work hard now, have fun later. This is an important quote that always keeps me sane and thinking right. My priorities are first and foremost before anything. If you just want to have fun all the time and never do anything productive you need to seriously reevaluate the direction your life is headed and try to do something about it if its not too late.

For a busy person like myself, it may be harder to keep following my guidelines and want to balance my work and play out more evenly, but I know that I can't. Being a student athlete is a very demanding lifestyle you must be ready to commit to. That's why there aren't a lot of us because not everyone is mentally strong enough to handle the work load of college classes and work. If you could put yourself in my shoes for one day you would understand why people like Sonia and I feel blessed to be in the position we are in to this day. It is easy to become nothing in life but it is hard to be somebody worth remembering.

Coming from the suburbs and seeing how hard times are for some of the people we grew up with, me and Sonia both chose another road that would take us away from the regular. To be blessed with an opportunity to be a wide receiver for a good school like southern is truly honoring and I am challenging myself to be the best player I can be off and on the field. It is important to keep chasing your dreams and working on your craft and priorities rather then always relaxing  or " just chilling." The harder you work now, the more fun you can have later on in life when your paid and retired from your long positive working career.

Pep Rally

 Last Friday, was a day before my first ever college homecoming game. I did not know that before every homecoming game that there is a pep rally for the football and all other sports teams at that. When my coach told us we had a pep rally after class, I truly didn't know what to expect.

When I first heard that the pep rally was in the Fieldhouse I didn't even want to go. I knew it was mandatory so I had to go regardless. Once I put my jersey on and seen how crowded the gym was, my mind was changed instantly. It was a nice excited crowd in the stand and it was a nice way to officially kick off the athletic program for the 2013-2014 season. I was impressed by the step dancers in their performance and I also liked how the gymnastics team entered the court when it was their time. Next year I

will be looking forward to the homecoming pep rally way more then I was this year.

Vocab

 Mastery in today's world that is not an easy quick thing to achieve. Honestly you cannot be a master of something unless you have comprehensive knowledge or skill in a subject or accomplishment. In today's society that is a high standard to live up to since the normal middle class society has gotten poorer due to our economy's struggles.

Honestly, it is a challenge that you must embrace in order to seek success in life. If you can't master a skill or information how do you expect to be a master? It takes time and hard work to get to the top. The more you keep working on your craft, the easier it will be over time and eventually become almost like a second nature.

Mastery

 As I  looked down the page of all the student blogs, they all looked like everyone put good effort into them. There were definitely a few blogs that stood out to me and caught my attention more then others. By now, the first quarter of our freshmen career is over, and we are soaking up information and applying it right along to the logic of our daily lives. "So far so good " is an understatement for the quality of work that I feel we are all producing as a whole.

 One person's blogs who I felt really was worthy of an A+ or A was Samantha S. Not only did she use critical thinking but her interesting title "My Style " made me click her blog see how it was instantly. I was not disappointed with her quality of work she put into her layout, along with her detail in her writing. All her blogs had a consistent mix-up of critical points, pictures, and graphics of text that was motivational and went right along with each week's assignments. Her post's are definitely one of the most elite blogs I've seen in our class thus far.

 Another person who I feel deserves an A on the blogs and is mastering these assignments is Caitlyn Mcavoy. I can tell that she put a lot of effort and time into her work. I like how she has an all white layout, it makes everything just look more graceful and original. I found myself agreeing with what she was talking about in some of her posts like the Math being a struggle. Overall it was clear to understand where Caitlyn was coming from and her information included with her arguments were impressive.

I could go on for days about the quality of work that is on that homepage. However, it is only so much I could say on these blogs but the point is the more challenges we have been getting the more we must answer back positively and keep adapting quick. I feel like we are definitely taking big strides forwards as a whole and its showing through the quality of work in our blogs.

Blog B

Over the past few weeks, we have been learning about the tendencies of the human mindset and motivation. Who knew that there would be different types of motivation and mindsets that could hold you back from maximizing your potential? I didn't think that there such thing as a “fixed mindset " that pretty much is content with the being that they are and they lack that extra drive that people with a growth mindset have.  There aren't that many options. Either your one or another and luckily, I am able to realize and rely on my growth mindset to push me to my limits and give me extra determination. 

 

Another topic that was interesting was discovering out that not only were there different types of mindsets but that there are also different types of motivations. However, I believe that I am an intrinsic motivation type of person. If I don’t have it in me to do something there is no way I am going to be bribed or convinced into doing it. This means that I don’t need any rewards for what of is expected of me. My conscience, mind, and body push and give me the drive I need when I am lacking or fatigued by the uphill challenges. You can’t always expect rewards for something that you are expected to do. Once you get used to handling your priorities and striving for the top on the regular basis it will become a second nature to have intrinsic motivation.

Alike the previous topic, I think the gritty personality fits in perfectly, it is an extension of how intrinsic motivation tells you keep persevering and staying strong. Grit is a non-cognitive trait that is felt when you have a passion from your heart to keep doing your best. This is a similarity to the growth mindset and intrinsic motivation. The self-determination and mental toughness to stay strong and be able to adapt at a high level to all that is thrown to one throughout life is respectable. That’s why it is called “gritty” when you grind it out and put your hardest effort into a long hard game of college football or whether you grind it out in school and work hard now and let everything pay off later. I am a big believer of working hard and proving myself to fullest.

In today’s society, there is a lot of struggles that one another go through on a daily basis. There has been plenty of adversity I have gone through so far in my life. With a new setting and lifestyle, there will be some new challenges. I don’t think I have been faced with anything harder than this adjustment to college as a whole. Not only am I not used to being just a wide receiver on the team instead of the star receiver, but handling the workload of advanced college classes in my first semester isn’t the easiest thing to do.

 

Since I have gotten to college, I must admit that it was more then what I expected. I did not expect to come to football

l camp and not be the superstar receiver that I am. However, reality kicked in fast as I did not see myself get into a game until last weekend. I knew that college football was faster and needed more dedication than high school but I did not expect to be a 2^nd string receiver, even as freshmen. Even though I am behind an upperclassman, I feel like if anything I should be seeing more reps in the games and get the opportunity and experience I need to show and evolve into the great player that I can be. As hard as it was at first to except that I’m not a starter, it also was a humbling experience. It made me reevaluate my work ethic and motivation. I believe that I am progressing everyday and that I am outworking myself more and more each day.

 

To add on to my pile of adjustments and dedication, college work is definitely a big reality check. I never listened to my old teachers and parents when they said college work requires a lot of will and time. At first I thought that it wouldn’t be a big change and that I could just get the success I use to get back in the past without putting in that much work. They were all correct about the effort needed in order to do this work on a daily basis. I can honestly say it has taught me how to manage my time more wisely. I have to do everything to my best ability and take life for the serious unpredictable journey it is. With an organized routine and pattern that can effectively get work done is something that is needed in order to stay on the top of my academic goals.