Learning is a continuous process of acquiring knowledge, skills and behavior necessary to cope up with the changing world. A person may have different reasons and ways to learn. And one may acquire this through formal education or from experiences and observations.
A lot of my colleagues and childhood friends asked me why do I need to still study over and over. I have a stable and good job. And I’m pretty confident of myself that I can impart the sufficient knowledge and skills to my students, though, I did not receive a degree in education.
During my early years in teaching, I was able to adapt to the methodologies and strategies in teaching through personal researches, observations and experimentations. Thanks to the wide arrays of knowledge that we can obtain in just a click – the world wide web. It was quite hard but learning to teach is challenging yet fulfilling once results are seen.
However, I felt that the knowledge and skills I’m getting were not structured. Though there are lots of good sites and free courses that I can take online, still, I felt incomplete and incompetent in my profession. This was the very reason why I enrolled to an Online University.
StuDYING. Working full-time while studying kills my leisure time in a positive way. You got to miss hanging out with friends, not having enough sleep, and skip family gatherings. But at the end of the day, there is a certain feeling of accomplishment knowing that I learned something. With just one module, I felt I learned a lot. What’s good with it is that I am learning what I am currently doing and what I am supposed to be doing. I have been learning new ways of teaching, the best methods of teaching in a particular situation and whatnot.
I am not the best learner or student. But I am determined to learn more and more each day. I do not want to skip a module without fully understanding a certain topic that I am reading. (I know it’s time-consuming and makes me miss deadlines.) But I’d rather miss deadlines than miss important details and information of what I am currently studying. I do not want to go back to what I previously studied and learn it again. So I make sure that I get the most of what I am learning as of the moment. Maybe that’s the reason why some people learn better than I do.
It’s a matter of time. Time-management is of the essence, especially for e-learners. But this is what’s good with learning online. You get to choose your own phase and your own time. Coz it’s hard to focus yourself in learning. Some people learns best in the morning, some in the afternoon and some at night. Some spends little time each day and some spends a day studying.
Distractions cannot be prevented. But these should be handled properly and effectively. Learning online might sound easy. But as I experience it first-hand, it is not how you think it is. You have facebook, instagram, youtube and twitter, which prevent a person to give full attention to my learning. However, I learned how to divert my attention and experiment on ways I could deal with it effectively.
Success in learning differs from person-to-person. One may say, topping the class means learning is effective. Getting high grades maybe some students’ definition of successful learning. However, in my personal view, effective learning equates a single change in knowledge and behavior. If a certain change in one’s thoughts or ideas or skills is evident then learning takes place. It maybe as simple as learning to tie you shoelace or as complex as learning to write in Mandarin.
Learning is a personal experience through formal education or informal situation or opportunity that may bring about a certain change in one’s thoughts or actions. Whereas, academic achievement is a formalized personal experience that results from learning.
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Several years from now, the world will be run by today’s youth. Therefore, it is critical on shaping what they know and experience right now. Their thoughts and actions at present will be reflected later on, hence, making education one of the best predictors of a country’s success in the future. Teaching in an international school is like shaping the world. Being able to teach students from different nations, from various countries and having diverse cultures is challenging yet gives a sense of fulfillment. It feels like I am teaching the world and the future of the world is counting on me in one-way or another.
MITCHEL AFRICA 
