Research Korner: Sample Reflective Essay

REFLECTIVE ESSAY ON COMMON SENSE AND INTEGRATIVE THINKING

REFLECTIVE ESSAY ON COMMON SENSE AND INTEGRATIVE THINKING             A lot of them old folks contend that what people needs is common-sense. While there are things that require learning from formal schooling, there are more practical ways of survival that calls only for common sense and not formal education. But what is common sense?             The Webster’s Dictionary defines common sense as, “sound practical judgment that is independent of specialized knowledge, training or the like.” It is also referred to as “normal native intelligence” like my folks contend. COMMON SENSE HAS A LOT TO DO WITH INTUITION             Common sense has a lot to do with intuition. Intuition is an insight that comes from the unknown or insight that comes from learning (Tesolin, 2004).  Lopez (2011) defines intuition in the similar manner. Intuition for him is the “intuitive use of judgment” where past experiences are foundations upon which a present or future problem is solved. Since each individual has different experiences, their use of common sense also differs.             Common sense hand in hand with intuition, aids in the ability of humans to survive. With common sense a person can anticipate and identify possible dangers. Aided by his past experiences, common sense nudges a person to use particular tools and materials appropriately and with good judgment. With common sense cause and effect relationships are also anticipated and predicted. (Lopez, 2011)             Is common sense intelligence? Is it inherent? Can it be taught? Is it learned? COMMON SENSE IS NOT INTELLIGENCE             Common sense is not intelligence. Intelligence measures the algorithmic mind. The algorithmic mind is the logical mind that processes information and makes systematic decisions from the information at hand. Intelligent people use the algorithmic mind. Common sense however uses the reflective mind. The job of the reflective mind is seeing into the environment for what it is, setting goals that are realistic and making it a guide in everyday decisions. It is the reflective mind that is not used and tapped in schools. Unfortunately not all decision-making require logical reasoning. This is where the educational system fails. Common sense may be inherent. But it can be taught in schools. (Willingham, 2009) INTEGRATIVE LEARNING USES THE PRINCIPLE OF CONNECTEDNESS             Schools do not teach common sense. That is the sentiment of my old folks. What schools teach is algorithmic reasoning. Algorithmic reasoning is logical and systematic thinking. Students who do well with this type of reasoning are labeled as intelligent because intelligence tests only measures algorithmic reasoning. Recent educational approaches however find weaknesses in the algorithmic principle of knowledge. Integrative approach to learning is now a popular approach in education.             Integrative learning is used in schools as a teaching strategy. This type of learning comes in a variety of ways such as putting and connecting together various knowledge and skills learned from a variety of sources and different experiences. Integrative learning also refers to the approach of utilizing and processing a variety and diversity of views even the contradictory ones and understanding them contextually. With integrative learning the individual applies his skills accumulated from his past and present into different settings. (Wikipedia, n.d.) Connectedness of life experiences over time and across all contexts is key to integrative learning (Rohen, n.d.). KNOWLEDGE IS NOT FRAGMENTED             Learning and knowledge is not fragmented. The problem with schools is that knowledge is handed down piecemeal, per course, without facilitating the students’ ability to connect the dots together. Integrative learning is an approach that has long been used in the higher education with the goal of enhancing students’ abilities to connect all the learnings that they have accumulated over time, across all courses, in their schools, at home, in their personal lives and community lives. Integrative learning is ultimately aimed for the students to make a better and informed-judgments in all areas of their lives by developing a mind that is able to make connections. (Benson and Desdrow, 2009)             Integrative learning on the surface looks like it seems to work with the algorithmic mind. Intuitiveness clearly is lacking in this approach. Nevertheless as integrative learning focuses on connectedness, common sense and integrated learning are two compatible elements involved in most decision-making. Benson and Desdrow (2009) believe that “common sense can enrich integrative thinking” as for me the relationship vive versa, common sense enriches integrative thinking and integrative thinking enriches common sense. REFERENCES: Common Sense. Webster Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language. 1989. New York: Portland House. Integrative Learning Project. [online] Available at:< http://gallery.carnegiefoundation.org/ilp/> [Accessed 3 June 2011]. Joy Benson, Sally Dresdow, (2009) "Common sense and integrative thinking", Management Decision, Vol. 47 Iss: 3, pp.508 – 517. Abstract only. [online] Available at:< http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1780836&show=pdf> [Accessed 3 June 2011]. Lopez, G., 2011. The Mind of Glenn Lopez. What is common sense? Blog. [online] Available at:< http://www.curiousglenn.co.cc/2010/06/what-is-common-sense.html> [Accessed 3 June 2011]. Rohen, L. Teaching Methods: Integrative Learning. [online] Available at:< http://fod.msu.edu/oir/TeachingMethods/integrative-learning.asp> [Accessed 3 June 2011]. Tesolin, A., 2004. You Can Build an Intuitive Organization. [online] Available at:<http://www.lastminutetraining.ca/articles.php/Intuition-and-Innovation/You-Can-Build-An-Intuitive-Organization> [Accessed 3 June 2011]. Wikipedia, n.d. Integrative Learning. [online] Available at:< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrative_learning> [Accessed 3 June 2011]. Willingham, D., 2009. Can Common Sense Be Taught? Encyclopedia Britannica Blog. [online] Available at:< http://www.britannica.com/blogs/2009/05/can-common-sense-be-taught/> [Accessed 3 June 2011].

REFLECTIVE ESSAY ON COMMON SENSE AND INTEGRATIVE THINKING

REFLECTIVE ESSAY ON COMMON SENSE AND INTEGRATIVE THINKING A lot of them old folks contend that what people needs is common...

Sociological Reading Response Paper on Beauty Up

Response Paper (Beauty Up)               The article tells the readers how the aspect of beauty is being explored at the same time manifested in men as the author persuades the imperative assumptions relating to Japanese body Aesthetics thus, giving valuable and precise arguments to direct factors of ‘Beauty Up’, emphasizing crucial discussions such as changing beauty ideology, male beauty work and other factors comprising the overall stance of the article. The author argued that there is more essence of true beauty as to what artificial beauty can offer, for one is the evolution of body aesthetics that have inspired many Japanese people particularly, Japanese men. The strength of the author incurs the logical interaction of how the situation works into the whole context providing strength to ideas and concepts in similar and different perspectives. Indeed, the author explains well on the male beauty work upon using concrete examples of how body aesthetics work in organized manner but at some point, the author was weak as she initially miss out on the notion that is can’t be just for men but for women as well.               There was inclusion of interviews upon investigating of new trend, the method used for supporting arguments deemed relevant as to why the author is somehow emphasizing too broad terms but not found any parallelism of such when it comes to informative approach.  There were also visits made into salons to acquire reliable evidence and there outcomes to cultural bias against women.               Arguments imposed by the author provide relevance to readers since, there is effort to obtain clear idea of beautiful objects, people judgments upon them and the motives underlying the acts which create them in order to raise the aesthetic life, allowing full scope to the disinterested feelings of curiosity and wonder to create emotional participation. Agreeing that, the objective method implied will not suffice to give readers an adequate idea of beauty among men. For beautiful things are created by men, not passively discovered which men made to realize something.       Citation:   Miller, Laura. (1953), ‘Beauty Up: Exploring Contemporary Japanese Body Aesthetics’. University of California Press (in, 2006) by The Regents of the University of California pp. 1-341. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London

Sociological Reading Response Paper on Beauty Up

Response Paper (Beauty Up) The article tells the readers how the aspect of beauty is being explored at the same time...

A Reflective Paper on Learning Experience in a Cross Cultural Environment Context

Reflective Paper Introduction Culture is learned. Man is not born with culture, but with the ability to learn, acquire, and develop culture through experience. For example, a child is born not knowing what culture is or how things are done in the eyes of society. But he learns through imitating, how thing are properly done. He then develops the necessary tools to go about his daily activities. Also, through the help of language, this is the primary tool for communication; the elder generation can pass to the younger generation the knowledge and skills they had acquired through experience. Therefore, because of these things, you could say that culture is learned.             All people have varied culture. There are differently groups of people around the world, and we call these groups different societies. A society may be a group of people banding together and living in a stable union, and pooling together their efforts to attain a common objective by collective action. Knowing this, people should not judge a custom of one society using his own since they both have different societies and culture. With this consideration, this paper gives a short overview of my observed behavioral pattern of the French and Chinese business culture. Understanding this behavioral pattern is important for doing effective communication with people and people groups from these countries. Effective communication is vital in establishing business and personal relationship in these countries. This paper is intended to be a reflection of my learning experience in a cross cultural environment context. The first part of the paper gives a short overview of my observed behavioral pattern of the French and Chinese business culture.  My Background I was born in Hong Kong but I finished my last 5 year of formal education in Australia. I have a Bachelor degree with a major in accounting from an Australian university. Prior to my undergraduate studies I had studied my year 11 and year 12 in a Catholic High school in Australia. I am a qualified accountant and have worked in the finance and accounting field for somewhat twenty years now. After I graduated, I worked in an Australian CPA firm for 3 years. These 8 years of oversea experiences have rooted my thinking pattern and communication style.   Cross Culture Environment             Culture is a group product. Culture was not designed by man to become what it has become. It is simply the accumulation of certain practices acquired by man through his interaction with other people. For example, I with my group may start out on a research. I may find a good method in doing this research with the help of another group mate. Other members may find a better way of improving the method I used in doing the research. And in due time, other groups may seem interested in my way of doing research and may try to imitate it. Just one person in the group may not be a Man just adapted whatever practice was most useful to him at the time and then went on to keep that practice as time went further on. Therefore, culture is not only learned but is also transmitted through human interaction and experience. A generation may put an imprint upon the one before it, thus, making an accumulation and selective result of group life.             I do believe that culture is transmitted from generation to generation or from another to one another. This may happen through oral traditions or in writing. It may be transmitted through everyday conversation, through interaction between the older and the younger, and even through reward and punishment. Culture is accumulated and whatever the past has learned, the present and future generation may build on it to produce something better which may aid them more as they go along the roads of everyday life. For example, when people in the early days wanted to preserve food to keep them from rotting, they put them in barrels filled with salt or put in seasoning or exposed them under the sun to dry. By doing that, they are still ensured of having meat which wasn’t rotten but lost the flavor of fresh meat. So, the future generation invented a better way of preserving the meat and its flavor, by freezing it, and they accomplished that with the aid of the refrigerator.             Another means of transporting knowledge from generation to generation is through books and spoken language. The accumulated knowledge and learning of the bygone scholars and great thinkers of the past are imparted to us through the books and other written materials in which they have so tediously spent their lives writing. And also, through the spoken medium; oral traditions may not have been successfully passed to the younger generations if not through the use of songs, tales, stories, and other such things. That is why communication arts is a very important part of the school curriculum.             With my experience in Coface, I would agree to say that culture is adaptive. Culture continually renews itself. It is even said that nothing is much more predictable than death, change, and culture change. Humans have a way of inventing things when he is in very much need of it. If he finds that the method he uses is no longer obtaining his desired results, he then turns to a new strategy which may give to him the results he so desires. For example, a teacher may find her class very rowdy, noisy and out of control. So she tries to shout on the top of her voice just to get the class’s attention. But it would only cause more of the riot, so, she tries another method. She keeps quiet and waits for the class to settle down. And settle they did. You see, this discovery of hers may result in a new behavior pattern which satisfies the characteristic mentioned above. Having works in Coface for the past 9 years has exposed me with tremendous multicultural interpersonal experiences. Coface is French insurance company operating as a Branch office in Hong Kong.  The Hong Kong office is managed by an expatriate from Head office to oversee the strategic development in the Greater China Region. We have three other French expatriates who are in charge of the underwriting, IT and operation department of the company. In my current position as head of finance department, I am further expose to PRC working culture environment.   My Learning Style Based on the learning style questionnaire given in the leadership and motivation course from MGSM last year, l realize that I am a kinesthetic learner I tend to spend a lot of time think through the problem. This can be a good way to work out a problem but I sometime may have waste a lot of energy analyzing and over analyzing the problem and not enough time actually solving the problem.  This assessment also revealed my learning style is more sensing meaning I tend to learn easier by memorizing facts. I am also a visual learner. I learn best by using pictures, diagrams and flowchart which I always think that my educational background and my profession of being an Accountant lead me to a sequential learner. I must admit that I do not always understand the big pictures, but can process the different elements of problem logically. Actually, this experience enables me to believe that intercultural competence does not only mean the ability of an individual to express his or her views and opinions intellectually. It also means that I must be developed wholistically to be able to understand and respect the culture, religion, beliefs, and practices of other individuals in the society. This concept means that I as intercultural competent person should be intelligent and at the same time respectful and open-minded regarding the issues and changes happening in my community. Without open-mindedness and ethno-relativism, knowledge regarding other cultures will not be applied effectively, and opens opportunities for racial discrimination and injustice in the society.   My Communication Style During my primary and junior high school education, the system of teaching in Hong Kong was much concentrated was pushing the knowledge to students and assess them only through written examinations. There was little or no opportunity for interactions where students could openly ask any questions. Asking too many questions will seems to be badly behaved students and lack of respect to the teacher. As a result, my communication skills and self confident was unconscious underdeveloped. However, I would say that under this kind of education environment, I was a good listener and I had my strength in understanding, viewing information from different perspectives and interpreting of information correctly. In my later years of senior high school which I was educated in Australia, there was a lot of focus and emphasis on communication and interaction during class. Students was encourage to ask as many questions as they wish and even the “native and stupid” questions was throw out which made whole class laughed, the Australian students was never shy about their behavior and the teacher treated all questions politely and professionally. I realize that my previous educational environment in Hong Kong has hindered my ability to communicate freely and effectively in the Australian society. As times goes by, I realized that every time I had to face the crowd, my confident built up until I finally overcame the challenge of not being able to understand the subject or topic well; I am able to communicate effectively and confidently than before.   Actually, I do several language studies and acquisitions in order to communicate effectively and confidently. My innate motivation affects the time I spent in learning a language. As my learning attitudes affect motivation, if I expect to succeed---I will be more likely to succeed, if I have  unreasonable expectations I may get discouraged, certain kinds of anxiety can interfere with my language learning, fear of making mistakes can inhibit your learning, too much correction or criticism can inhibit my learning, the more positive I feel about the speakers of a language, the more motivation I will have to learn it, if I want to communicate with speakers of a language, I will be more motivated to learn it, and if I need to use a language, I will be more motivated to learn it. People learn better if their learning is encouraged by speakers of the language, People need to experience language used in context, if speakers of two languages really want to communicate, they can do a lot with a little, people have expectations about who speaks which language, communication tends to take the easiest path, people may resist speaking their language because they want to learn your language, people often modify their speech when speaking to foreigners, in traditional cultures there may be only one right way to do something, it may be culturally inappropriate to be too direct in what you say, and every culture has taboo topics. Basically, language acquisition is a developmental process.  I understand that learning a language build up own systems, we need lots of comprehensible input, we can improve the sound discrimination, memory, and grammatical sensitivity skills, we can compensate for deficiencies in some skills. From my experience, I discover that the sooner we can acquire the grammatical system of a language, the sooner we can use the language creatively, we need chances to negotiate meaning with native speakers, native speakers often highly value good pronunciation, repetition helps things stick, producing language that sounds too good can be misleading, the more meaningful exposure, the more we learn, we cannot rely on memorization alone, memorized material can give a false impression of your proficiency, our brain analyzes language whether we know it or not, knowing a language is different from knowing about a language, knowing about a language may help us learn it, body language, gestures, and we communicate as much as words, learners build up an auditory image of what the language sounds like, language learners need to learn to understand and produce well-formed discourses, predictable scripts aid comprehension, language learners seem to hit plateaus, we need exposure to language in a variety of social settings, one language may interfere with another, the mind tends to filter out redundant material, productive skills are harder than receptive skills, comprehensible output can become comprehensible input, knowing the topic helps us interpret what we hear or read, linguistic context helps us understand the meaning of words, knowledge of a language may lie dormant, but be reactivated, multilingual people may associate languages with a particular setting or audience.       Team Work Skill Although I like structure, I can be pretty flexible. I am flexible with plans and changes. I think flexible is a good skill as long as I am not being taken advantages of. I listen to understand requirement of the other person’s position. I like to observe people, especially if I do not really know them. This helps to refine my judgment of the person personality, prepared myself better for future interpersonal relationship and negotiation. Due to my professional background, high respect to deadline is the fundamental value of an Accountant. Occasionally, I might seem to be insensitive to my team and other colleagues in delivering projects and work on time.  Having known the downside of the Accountant role, I always try to accommodate requests and allow flexibility so long it will not affect the timeliness of the project. From this wonderful experience, I discovered that the key task and process strategies of creating and working within the context of a multicultural team are: team building; communication and its process; participation; conflict management; and performance evaluation. In building multicultural teams, the manager must be able to develop a shared strategy on how the team will work together. The utilization of team building programmes and activities is deemed uncomplicated yet effective through simple socialization exercises that results to cultural learning opportunities. The concept of teamwork is also credited to the affirmative effects on the psychological health and interests of organisation’s member. Communication, on the other hand, serves a number of fundamental functions such as control, motivation, emotional expression, and information. It maintains values and relationships necessary to keep the system of the united organisation. Similarly, participation should be directed towards team dynamics and extends beyond organization’s success. Managers must be able to promote participation among employees through motivation and the likes. The case of conflict management is also inherent. Multicultural work settings are often challenged by conflict, thus managers should be able to implement the appropriate conflict resolutions strategies (e.g. effective communication). Lastly, performance evaluation must be rooted not only on individual basis but also on collective contributions of the members of multicultural team towards the achievement of organization’s objectives and overall success, productivity and competitive advantage.   Action plan: 	<li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 200%"> 	 	Understand linguistic ability, allow for limitation to express one’s 	</li> 	<li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 200%"> 	patience 	and respect</li> 	<li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 200%"> 	show 	cultural empathy to understand and appreciate cultural differences 	</li> 	<li class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 200%"> 	 	understand the interpersonal skills</li>   First, considering that I am doing business in a multicultural environment that has its own trade-related culture and as a part of acculturation, I will set on with the “Coface corporate system”. In the business world, acculturation serves as the common denominator for host and foreign culture to avoid conflict and miscommunication. At this situation, I need not to compare the culture of France with the Hong Kong’s culture. Instead, the least but could be the best thing to do is to “co-exist” with the existing policy present in the host culture. Acculturation is a” term originally applied only to the process concerning a foreign culture, from the acculturing or accultured recipient point of view, having this foreign culture added and mixed with that of his or her already existing one”. In the process of acculturation, I must try to accustom my self to the “mother culture”. However, cultural differences may come along. But it is still important to consider that every culture has its own characteristic and views on things. Culture is relative and that it does not mean that what is “right” in Hong Kong is “wrong” in France when it comes to work environment. Second, as a part of cultural integration, I will adapt to the international policies of the host country.  I should be familiar with the host culture. Believing that the cultural incorporation will solve all of the cross-cultural problems, it is essential that the expatriate need not to be only technically proficient but to have an overly simplistic view of the cultural integration of the firm's activities and existing culture on the host culture. Using an integrator can help. It will give an idea on how will a foreign culture will mix up with a host culture. An example of integrator is the manager or inhabitant workers to the host culture. Their presence will be used in communicating with people involve in some business circumstances. I do believe that cross-cultural communication plays a vital role in any business world. The awareness and knowledge that they hold will provide needed information that could lessen up the problem of cultural resistance and differences. By doing it so, problems in communication could be minimized if not alleviated.   Final Assessment             It was already mentioned that education and learning, influences the ability of an individual to become intercultural competent. Not only does it depend on one’s knowledge of language, but also on one’s ability to empathize and respect another’s cultures and beliefs. In countries where ethnic diversity is on the rise, whether due to political upheavals, economic conditions, climactic catastrophes, shifting populations, or simply increased contact among people of different backgrounds, successful relationships with friends, neighbors and intercultural partners depend on the ability to deal with differences in a positive manner. From the arena of international business to family life, there is an increasing need to be able to deal effectively and appropriately with diversity, whether ethnic, racial, religious, or cultural. With this, international and intercultural organizations play an important role, and this is to provide not only pleasant and productive educational experiences form their participants, but also to indirectly affect their families, neighbors, and communities. Furthermore, in order for one to truly become intercultural competent, it is important to learn about an individual’s own culture and about other cultures. One way is to cultivate relationships with individual who can serve as cultural informants, or people whom a person can question about the culture and verify perceptions. Another way is to attend cultural events in communities to learn about rituals and values, and demonstrate interest to members of that culture’s community. Finally, one can be flexible in his or her intercultural interactions by reserving judgments about behaviors and intentions until he or she understands the cultural context in which they were generated.

A Reflective Paper on Learning Experience in a Cross Cultural Environment Context

Reflective Paper Introduction Culture is learned. Man is not born with culture, but with the ability to learn, acquire, and develop ...

An Example Of Reflective Essay In Speech

LIFE IS A STRUGGLE         It as much as I remembered it was 1969, it seems to me that life has always been full of struggle and misery and life itself is a struggle, you may ask why? this is my story. My father then was a businessman he was rich and popular he use to be the Sheriff in Colorado while my mother is the owner of one of the best restaurant in town, when I was born we use to occupy the biggest house in Texas Colorado County and people seem to care every now and then. We get all the compliments from neighbors for being the most successful family in town later on we have achieved a bigger wealth through my father’s discourse from the wealthiest man in town Sir Laurence Emerson given us more than $ 5 million dollar a Mercedes Benz and an opportunity to travel all around the world in exchange for a deal only both of them could understand.       While I was only 12 years old then and I was their only begotten son I have all the luxury I could ever imagine. My mother seems to be even more successful for the recognition coming from her business. Everything is quite right while still I continue to gain all the luxury I ever wanted for quite a while. A year after my father’s soul took flight in a heart failure when he realized that the biggest house we owned has been destroyed by ravaging fire that nobody knows for when it came nobody can tell all we knew is that it was lost and nothing is left but dust including all the wealth and the possession that he has established was later sequestered by the government because of the false accusation and documents that my father had acquired everything in illegal means.       Only the business of my mother and I was left that we decided to live there while she continues to weaken because of the death of my father until she can no longer stand the pain that she kept in her heart pain we have long suffered. Her debt slowly grows bigger until he died in hopelessness and struggle and brokenness in a year or so. I being the only begotten has no place to live for I didn’t know how to handle such possession and the only thing I know is that it was owned by their manager who forsaken for a time to take all of my wealth that’s left in its legal entity, I was only 14 then and I didn’t know where to go and for quite a time I was held by some relatives but treated me differently like before, a drifter to clean their roof in winter but glaze of snow struck me and I fall on their roof that makes my eyes blurry for a time.       They even ask me to treat their visitors like a servant till my body could no longer understand the simplicity of their conviction of who am I? The compliments and images that my parents have once built has also put to shame by my neighbors in my name that we are a family of criminals till my soul could no longer resist the persuasion of their words that I decided to left Texas and begin my Journey anywhere in Colorado and for a time take a chance in Denver and anywhere else I can go at the of 16 using my blurry eyes. For being a renaissance man nobody would notice me and therefore freedom is achieved. Sometimes I remembered and sometimes I understand that I was once the son of one of the richest man in Colorado and who cares if I look savage and wild for I never taken a bath for quite sometimes in fact I never had my any clothes when I left Texas but who are you to judge me for my attitude?       Yes! I was once rich, I held a thousand dollars in my pocket at the age of five, I use to ride a Mercedes Benz with my family and wear all the best clothes made of animals in Africa and Caribbean I also visited England and see their queen at the age of 12 but you just got to believe me. For today you just got to give me some food because I’m hungry, I don’t know long it has been maybe 20 years or 25 the only thing I remembered is that 1969 when I was 12 I have everything I ever had but I know it was all gone.       It seems to me that life is a struggle, the largest house we used to occupy is a 12 room house we had 4 chamber maids, 3 house servants and a driver who stole our Mercedes Benz and has been gone for a time but everything has turned to dust. I beg you to give me some food to eat or some water to drink for my eyes can’t see. I know I’m a beggar now and the only richest I ever had is my life and this misery but I am going to tell about my past and I the only begotten son and our richest we have acquired when I was young. You just got to give me some food, for my life is a struggle.                      Interesting News Credit:ivythesis.typepad.com

An Example Of Reflective Essay In Speech

LIFE IS A STRUGGLE It as much as I remembered it was 1969, it seems to me that life has always been full of struggle and mis...

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