Work Experience Goal Setting and Learning Plan

Part One: Goal Setting (PRIOR TO/START OF WORK PLACEMENT)  

  1. Describe your current strengths and interests in relation to your work placement.  
    • Strengths: I can confidently ask questions and work collaboratively and effectively as a team. I am proficient in Excel, Word, and PowerPoint, I am a tech savvy person, this includes being able to catch on to concepts related to technology easily with minimal guidance and adapting to new information and context rapidly. Moreover, my organizational skills serve as a strong foundation, ensuring that tasks are completed efficiently but also with detail.  
    • Interests: I am enthusiastic about applying my skills to real-world scenarios, solving problems, and continuously learning from the experiences that this work placement could provide me. I look forward to actively engaging, taking on challenges, and further developing both my technical and interpersonal skills within a professional setting. 
  2. With reference to the course goals, employable skills and core competencies (see reference sheet), list three specific goals you have for your work experience placement.  
    • Be open and respond constructively to change and learn from your mistakes and accept feedback.  
    • adapt to changing requirements and information, continuously monitor the success of a project or task and identify ways to improve 
    • listen and ask questions to understand and appreciate the points of view of others 

Part Two: Growth (END OF WORK PLACEMENT)  

  1. Discuss your growth in each of the three goals listed above. Provide specific evidence of growth and development.  
    • My first goal was to be open and respond constructively to change and learn from your mistakes and accept feedback. I believe that I have achieved this goal. Looking at the way I worked now and from the beginning of my placement, I think my mindset and habits have changed. In the beginning of my work placement, I thought it was embarrassing to ask a lot of questions because I thought that meant I had bad understanding of what I was doing. After some time, I started to ask lots of questions because I realized that I had no experience and that it was natural for me to learn through asking questions. Through asking these questions, I realized that I had made some mistakes in the past, because of this I knew I needed to ask my supervisor to delete those files and that I needed to re-file them. Although the process of constantly asking questions may be frustrating, I learnt from my mistakes and gained a better understanding. 
    • As I said In my first goal, my habits and daily routine has largely changed from the beginning of my work placement. I was unfamiliar on how to properly scan and file the documents in the beginning. As days past, I started to get into the habit of filing efficiently. I achieved this through using paperclips and sticky notes to categorize the types of files. This helped me improve my confidence in my work knowing that I had filled the documents properly. I also learnt how to file a couple different types of forms such as personal forms, corporate forms, and financial statements. I adapted to new requirements and information from the first day as I had no experience in accounting, so I needed to take in lots of information and needed to get used to the platforms I was required to use such as Citirix, Pracman, and Docit. 
    • During my process of asking questions, I asked questions to lots of different people such as my supervisors and co-workers. This allowed me to both learn more about my job as well as form good workplace relationships. For example, I noticed that while I was asking questions about where to file certain forms to my supervisor, he would also explain to me what these forms are about and how they are used. When I would ask my co-workers questions, they would gladly help me and even show me how to do it. I really appreciated these aspects because I felt understood and cared for 

Chemistry 11 – Midterm Self-Assessment and Goal-Setting


Strength and Weakness content paragraph: 

A strength I have for the atomic theory was orbital diagrams as well as electron arrangement. I think a weakness I had was remembering the core content from last year which led to some mistakes on the unit test. A strength I have for the bonding unit was learning how to draw the vespr diagrams, and determining polar and non-polar molecules, I think this is because I practiced a lot of worksheet questions over and over again until I had a good understanding. A weakness I had for the bonding unit was more of the theory part we learnt in the beginning of the unit as well as the intermolecular bonding. A strength I had for the mole unit was the unit conversions as well as the labs, this unit gave me a good understanding on how to complete labs efficiently. A weakness I had for this unit was STP and SATP.


End of Semester update: Goal reflection 

My goal during mid-semester was to study a little everyday. I would say I was partly successful with this goal as I saw an increase with my studying especially with going to the library at least 3 times a week. This showed me better results both academically and with my understanding, this also helped reduce the amount of silly mistakes I made during tests, quizzes, or labs. Something that I found to be very successful during long study sessions was to go with a friend or classmate as I was able to ask questions or take small breaks with them. I am still working towards learning on how to study effectively, although I learnt that studying at the library was significantly more effective, there were still times I felt that I wasted time procrastinated. Moving forward I will try different studying techniques to see which one works for me.

Physics & Pre- Calc 11 – Midterm Self-Assessment and Goal-Setting


End of Semester update: Goal reflection 
Yes, I would say I met my goal. Although I did not study for 3 hours a day every day, I learnt to alter my study schedule appropriately to how many assignments or tests I needed to study for. This is because I realized that I having a good personal/school life balance is also important. Instead, I went to the library 3-4 times a week usually with a friend and study for upcoming tests or work on assignments. A success I found with my goal was learning more about what works for me in terms of studying effectively, a challenge was finding motivation spending long periods of time studying. Like I mentioned before, a strategy that really helped was studying with friends or classmates. This really helped because I always had someone I could ask questions to, work on an assignment together with, or even just to take a break with. Since co-op is a pretty work heavy course, next semester I don’t think I would need to study as much but I will still continue studying in the library with friends using the same study techniques. A goal I would like to focus next semester is to ask more questions during class.

Science 10H- Astronomy Wonder Project

Are we able to use dark matter to benefit humanity? And if so, how can that be achieved with the correct technology?


What do we know about dark matter? 

Dark matter is a type of material that has gravity, found in the universe that does not emit or reflect light, for this reason it is invisible and all light passes though. Dark matter makes up around 25 percent of the universe. Since dark matter is invisible to the naked eye, astronomers use gravitational lensing to detect its impact. They can achieve this by looking at how the gravity of large galaxy clusters bends and distorts the light of faraway galaxies found behind the clusters. Dark matter is thought to be “halos” surrounding galaxies, they hold together galaxies and everything inside them to avoid the substances rapidly flying out into the void or the universe. Dark matter is identified as cold  as well as having a neutral charge.

Assumptions of Scientists 

Although we do not have a solid answer to what dark matter is made of, most scientists think that a majority of dark matter includes undiscovered subatomic particles called WIMPs (weakly interacting massive particles). These particles only interfere with the force of gravity and another force called the weak nuclear force. At one point, scientists thought WIMPs could be a neutral subatomic particle called neutrinos, but this was proved wrong as neutrinos move too quickly. Nonetheless, scientists took a different approach and theorized a hypothetical WIMP called neutralinos, which are antiparticles without electrical charge. These neutralinos apply to cold dark matter as cold dark matter’s particles move slower. Dark matter could also supply extra gravity to form more compact structures.

Jia Liu and his discoveries 

In 2009 Jia Liu (a physicist) released a research paper explaining on how using dark matter as an energy source can power spacecrafts on extremely long missions. His assumption like many scientists was that part of dark matter was made of neutralinos, and in some right circumstances, they “wipe out” each other and convert all their mass into energy. If his assumption is true a pound of dark matter would have the potential to produce approximately 5 billion times as much energy as a pound of dynamite. This reveals that a dark matter engine would have enough force to power a rocket ship through the cosmos. Additionally, his engine would be different from a regular rocket, a spaceship would not need to carry as much fuel since the engine would be able to gather more dark matter along the parts of space with large amounts of dark matter. On top of that the quicker the rocket travels, more dark matter would be “scooped up” and accelerate.

You're Interacting With Dark Matter Right Now - The Atlantic

Conclusion/My thoughts

While I was researching this topic I could not find much information on how dark matter could benefit humanity. This lead me to the conclusion that we still need to do more research on this specific topic and a specific answer would be hard to achieve in the near future. Although Jia Liu’s Theory may or may not be correct, this lead me to think that if astrophysicists/physicists/ other scientists are able to create new technologies focused on obtaining dark matter, and what it is made from, it could potentially lead to new discoveries about our solar system, the Milky Way, our galaxy, and even beyond that. We all know that the universe is filled with many mysteries and unknowns. Maybe these new technologies can help us discover a more in-depth understanding of the universe. Who knows? The discovery of new planets and substances could lead to new medicines, and technologies that could benefit us!


Sources:

Photo:

shutterstock_52494787-thumb-570×427-125951.jpg

Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HneiEA1B8ks

Text:

Unknown. (n.d.). Dark energy and dark matter. Dark Energy and Dark Matter | Center for Astrophysics. Retrieved April 1, 2023, https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/research/topic/dark-energy-and-dark-matter
Unknown. (2021, May 3). Dark matter and dark energy’s role in the universe. Science. Retrieved March 31 2023, from

Lerner, K. L. (2020). Dark matter. In Gale Science Online Collection. Gale. Retrieved March 31, 2023 https://link-gale-com.bc.idm.oclc.org/apps/doc/FHJXMV811075179/SCIC?u=43riss&sid=bookmark-SCIC&xid=6b866d24

Garner, R. (2017, February 6). Discoveries – highlights. NASA. Retrieved April 1, 2023, from

Hooper, D. (2023). Dark matter. In World Book Advanced. Retrieved April 1, 2023
https://www-worldbookonline-com.bc.idm.oclc.org/advanced/article?id=ar148330

Liu, J. (2009, August 11). Dark matter as a possible new energy source for future Rocket Technology. arXiv.org. Retrieved April 1, 2023, from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/45866781_Dark_Matter_as_a_Possible_New_Energy_Source_for_Future_Rocket_Technology