Strand: Creativity, Service

Me along with other students of grade 11, had taken the initiative to organize an event named Monsoon musings. Monsoon musings is an open platform where anyone and everyone is welcome to speak up and present their work of literature in any manner possible. It can be through a poem, write up or simply speaking out their thoughts and experiences in a beautiful way. There was also an opportunity for the audience to donate any amount of money they wish to, which would later be given for charity to an NGO for the “Missing girls”. In the following event, I was present as a project aid- decoration head to help them with the decorations. I also took the opportunity to anchor the event for which I wrote my own script. Moreover, I was the decor head, hence it required prior planning so that problems are not caused later on. This event helped me achieve many learning outcomes:

LO3: demonstrating how to initiate and plan a CAS experience.

I did this when I had to start pre-planning the decoration arrangements of the event. I had to make sure that if there was any last-minute crisis on how to handle it and have a backup ready. I was also a host, hence it required prior planning and coordination about the flow of the event which would avoid any chaos later on.

LO5: Demonstrate the skills and recognize the benefits of working collaboratively.

 I catered to this learning outcome because decoration as well as hosting required working collaboratively with co-team members. I demonstrated my skills like coming up with decoration ideas that require less hard work and resources but still look appropriate for the event. Since we worked collaboratively with the decor team, other members of the group gave in their inputs which were important for the improvisation of my idea. Therefore collaborative working was very beneficial.

LO1 identifying own strengths and developing areas for growth

I catered this by identifying my strengths and weaknesses of working in a group. In a group, it is my strength to give in ideas more open-mindedly because it reduces my fear of not being right, as other members give feedback and help me improve my idea. However, my weaknesses are the inability to come to a conclusion when working with people who have varied opinions and ideas. So it helped me realize how I need to rationalize my decisions and choose something even if it isn’t my idea because it might be better than mine. I also learned a lot of things like how to work patiently and respect everyone’s ideas and opinions. 

This CAS experience helped me become open-minded as a person.  The activity did not only benefit me but each one of them who participated in the event. As the event was all about expressing and sharing, the event gave people an opportunity to communicate with each other. When I learned to plan things and have backups, it helped me become more confident about my choices and decisions. The planning, executing, and reflecting upon my actions is definitely going to help me be more practical while I plan and conduct such events in the future. For example, being able to cater to any last-minute changes will help me become flexible and adaptable to changes that can make a lot of things easier. To some extent, certain difficulties helped me make quick and independent decisions.