New Year, New Semester

It has been well over a month since my last blog post. A lot has happened since then so I thought I would catch you all up on the things I have been up to.

I started my spring 2018 semester in mid-January. Over the entire break, since I was not taking any classes, I was itching to get going on the new semester. I was tired of doing nothing and was aching to get back into the routine of school. So I was pretty relieved my break was over.

This semester, I am taking four classes: 3 are online and 1 is on campus. The three courses that are online are (1) Elementary Japanese 1, (2) Introduction to Music, & (3) Women and Gender studies. So far, all three courses have been taking up so much of my time. Although I am super busy with trying to keep up with all the assignments, quizzes, and other tasks, I am truly enjoying them all.

Japanese has been very fun and has not been too difficult since a lot of what I'm learning I previously learned in high school when I took Japanese for my language elective. The only complaint I have about the course is that we have to turn in homework once a week at my professor's office and go in once a week for a face-to-face session with the TA. Other than that, I am enjoying my Japanese course.

To fulfill my fine arts credits, I decided to take Introduction to Music. A lot of my friends took studio art for non-majors but if I'm being completely honest, I cannot draw to save my life! I did not really care to take the other music course that happens on campus although you, actually get to play musical instruments. So, my last option was to go for Intro to Music. So far, it has been going well. Since I was about six years old, my parents enrolled me into piano lessons which I did for 12 years and after that I was always immersed into music at school and in church so I learned a lot of the technical things and theory about music at an early age. This previous knowledge has helped me so much for this course because I'm re-learning and re-discovering these concepts over again which is really nice.

The third online course I am taking is Women and Gender studies. This is a required course at my university and it is a subject that is very new to me. Unlike the other two courses, this course requires me to truly think and reflect on the course material because it is something I am learning about for the first time. Right off the bat, this course has caused me to take a deeper look at who I am not just as a woman but as a human being. Although some of my professor's discussion questions are very deep and can be difficult to understand, I am getting the hang of it all and am really enjoying it so far.

The last course I am taking is one that is on campus and it is Fundamentals of Communication. This course is another "easy" course for me because it is so relatable. Previous semesters when I would have friends recommend which teacher to take, they always told me, "Oh, take this professor. She's super easy. Hardly any course work" or "You don't really do much you just do your speeches and then you're done". No one really talked to me about the things I could learn from this course. So instead of taking the "easy" way out, I decided to take an instructor who I never heard about and I'm so happy I went that way. I am learning so much from our textbook as well as from my instructor who is a practicing psychiatrist. She is so amazing at teaching us various skills and makes the material so easy to enjoy.

If any of you are just starting out college, one thing I did that I would highly recommend you do is that you shouldn't take the word of others for which professor or which courses to take. Don't take courses that all your friends are taking or that the professor is so easy it's a joke. I challenge you to challenge yourself. That is something I have definitely learned to do during these 2 years in college. I have learned so much about various subjects and about my personal self while engrossed in various challenges. You'll really get to know who you are and find a lot of meaningful people along the way.

Thank you for reading my post about my courses this semester. I will definitely post up an update in the future on how things are continuing to progress. As always, thank you.