Final Blog

So something that I thought would be interesting to be made was a car that ran on a renewable source of energy and Batman! I LOVE BATMAN. There I said it. Anyways I was thinking about the batmobile that he drives and I was just thinking about what he used as a energy source. I was thinking that since it was just a comic he would just use something like a cool source of energy such as idk... uranium or something. But then I thought hmmm since he had to drive around in the batmoblie a lot where did he go to the bathroom? So I was like RIGHT! obviously the renewable source of energy was Batman's you know what. I was like gross...but then I looked around online and found that a dog park had used dog's you know what to power it. So... think about it. A car that ran on free energy. A genius idea! You could make plenty of money off it!

Empathetic Listening

Some things that I noticed when I was listening "empathetically" was that it is really really hard to do. One of the big things that you need to do is to "be non-judgmental" or to "suspend our own agenda's". I sort of struggled with this a bit because if I heard something that was wrong or something that I disagreed with I would want to have comment/rebut what was said. Other than that I think I did pretty well with the whole "listening empathetically" thing. I was able to let them speak, maintain eye contact(well not really since this was through the internet), give my friend my full attention, ask good questions, and try on their shoes. Something that I think is different between communicating live and online is that it is much easier to formulate good questions or understand what they are saying when you are talking online. It feels like you have more time if you are talking online rather than offline. I'm not sure why but thats what I think. What I think I would need to work on is not trying to use examples from my life to solve any problems my friends might have. If they wanted it they would have asked me. It isn't really a empathetic thing to do. Something that I learned from empathetic listening is that most of the time people just want to be heard, they don't need anything from me.

Blog Entry 5

Sorry if you can't understand what I am saying. My webcam sucks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_h62pFAR278

Toulmin model

Claims:

I needed to miss the i-Checkpoint to go to a tutoring session for math,

Grounds:

There is a midterm on Monday and Thursday is the last day they have for tutoring before the test.

Warrants:

I need to study to get an A.

Backing:

Getting tutored helps me with any problems or misconceptions that I may have had about the information that is going to be on the test.

Qualifier:

Going to tutoring sessions will increase my grade.

Communication with Professor

Here is a email that was sent to my math professor:

Dear Professor Ahlgren

My name is Shih-Hao Chien and I am in your 231 class.

I have a question about what I should do about the discussion class. I had originally signed up for the BD7 discussion class and I had started going to that session. However I later changed my schedule around and somehow ended up with the BD5 discussion class(I am not sure how). I had signed up for webassign later so I am in the BD5 section for webassign, however I had been going to the BD7 discussion class because I hadn't realized that my section was changed. I am wondering what I should do about this because it seems that I dont have any grades for any of the worksheets and only for one of the hw assignments. So what should I do?

Shih-Hao Chien

Computer Engineer Freshman

chien8@illinois.edu

His Reply:

Hello,

I just read both of your emails.

Your name is listed in the BD5 class, although no grades are recorded there.

If you have been attending BD7, then the TA for BD7 (Alex Duda) has a list of the grades for the work which you have turned in.

If you wish to attend BD7, then please

1) Switch sections through the university system (the math undergraduate office in 313 Altgeld Hall can provide any needed help).

2) email me and Alex Duda to tell me that you have made the switch

I will change your section in webassign when I hear back from you.

This should be done soon.

Best,

SA

Taking Initiative

My story for taking initiatives and expanding my network are short and simple because I am still waiting for return emails from the people I emailed to. So the first way I took initiative is through the way I am trying to submit my resume and my application for a Microsoft internship that I am hoping to apply for. So instead of only submitting it online, I wanted to contact someone who had done the internship in the past to ask them questions about how the internship would go and to see if I could get the contact information of some of the people who headed the project. Lucky for me I know plenty of people who have done Microsoft internships before who have made friends in the area that I was interested in. Unfortunately I have yet to get a response because I just thought of this idea just a day or two ago. The other thing that I did was get in contact with one of my old co-workers at an internship that I did a while back. I hadn't planned to use her as a reference in my resume however since she did know me quite well I thought that she would be an excellent reference.

Since I really don't have much in terms of initiative, I think the best way to follow up is to plan ahead for what I am going to do with my contacts. For the Microsoft thing, I think that I will try to see if I can develop a working relationship with the people who work on the stuff that I want to intern for. This way they would have a sense of who I am as a person, and if they like me and they want to to work on the internship, they could put in a good word so that I would have a better chance of getting the position that I want.

Blog Entry # 1: Missing Basics and Skills that We Need to Learn

When I first heard of the concept of the Missing Basics, I honestly didn’t pay attention. I thought that it was just one of those introductions for another educational program. Like I didn’t buy into idea that in classes/college, we weren’t being taught how to thrive in a business setting. Classes are meant to teach you something whether it be how to do well at your job or how to use your mind to its fullest potential. Well… This was what I thought until I stepped into my first class on my first day. The first thing that stood out to me was the sheer size of my class. 200+ students in one room being lectured by one teacher for less than one hour. It was then that I realized that what Prof. Goldberg had been speaking about was, with no doubt, true. Yes, classes were meant to educate us. However, life skills, that are used each and every day in any profession, become one of the important pieces of knowledge that fall through the cracks of our education due to the number of willing learners.
We, as students, will most certainly be taught a plethora of things in our time in college everything from how to play beer pong to how to solve complicated physics problems, however the missing basics that slipped through the cracks will never be taught to us. I think that it is important, as a freshman, to recognize some of those missing basics as soon as possible, so that you, as an individual, can learn those skills now rather than having to learn them through mistakes that you may possibly make in the business world.
I think that the most important skill that anyone should to learn would be communication. I am not just talking about learning to chat with other people, I’m pretty sure we can all do that already. Rather I am talking about learning to be able to express what you are thinking to others in a fashion such that they fully comprehend what you are saying. For instance, when two engineers talk to each other about the design of a plane, each of the engineers must be able to explain what they have designed and how it works in a way so that the other engineer can understand and regurgitate what the other had said. If the engineers are not able to do this, it is possible that the final construction of the plane could have flaws that should not exist. I think the big thing about this skill is that this isn’t something you can learn in a classroom. It is something you have to learn through experiences rather than lectures. I think that the best way for me to develop this skill would be to make myself to interact with others in group settings. This could be in terms of a class project or a lab, anything that involves the interaction between two or more people can be used to learn how to clearly explain what you are thinking. So my goal is, by the end of this first semester, to have spent a lot of time communicating with other people, trying to clearly vocalize what I am thinking. I am not saying that I am going to have mastered this skill, but I think that by the end of my senior year I will have become proficient enough so that when I enter the workforce my co-workers will be able to understand what I am saying.
Another important skill that I think I need to definitely work on are having the courage to ask for help. I think that the major problem in the skill is that it involves ignoring your pride, something that isn’t the easiest thing to do. I would admit that I am a very proud person. Not that I think that I am smarter than everyone else, but that I would rather start an argument than admit I was wrong. I am sure that this isn’t just me. I mean seriously, who would want to seem stupid and useless. Pride can definitely get in the way of work. If someone has too much pride and doesn’t know how to finish part of a project, it isn’t going to just be him who gets hurt, but also everyone else that is in his group. I think the best way for me to learn how to get past this is to be able to go to my Professor and TA’s office hours and ask questions. Even if I already know that answer, there is nothing wrong with double checking to make sure that you are right. It is better to learn how to questions now than later where there might not be any teachers to help you. I truly believe that I will still be working on this skill on the day before I retire, but hopefully by then I will have learned quite a bit.
Finally the third skill that I think that I need to work on would be how to view things on a larger scale. The work that I may be doing in the future could affect peoples of all nationalities, but if I am not able to recognize that, the work could have little to no impact on anyone or anything. I need to learn to look at the immediate results of actions and the results that might not appear years after the actions. I think the best way for me to learn how to view everything on a larger scale would to be somewhere else, looking on how race, religion, and ethnicity could affect the results of my actions. The best way for me to do this, in my opinion, would be to go out in the work and study abroad. That is why I plan for my junior year to be spent studying abroad, in a country where I understand little to none of the customs of the natives. I feel by doing so that I would be able to look at whatever task I am giving and recognize that other people could react differently than to how I would react. But for now, I am happy to join clubs such engineers without borders to learn how to perceive in a view not of my own.
There are plenty of other skills for me to master, however for now I will be working my hardest to master these skills so that when I enter the work force I will be a very well trained employee that doesn’t get burdened down with having to learn skills that should have been taught earlier on in life.