Like a pelican, there was much to take in: all the water and fish my beak could handle…and more.  Whew!  And, like the pelican, some of that weight had to go periodically….just spew out the unneeded water and keep the fish.

That’s what this class has done for me.  At first, I took in everything and that was too much.  But as the class has gone along, I have learned to be discerning and not take in as much water with the fish (the good information).  Because I learned what my natural learning style is all about, I can do that.  Yes, I take notes as I read and my kinesthetic need for examples is fulfilled with the natural design of on-line learning.  Instructors, of necessity since they are not looking you in the eye in the classroom, have to give examples so you can figure out what they are talking about.  That works so very well with me.  And it will continue to do so: that’s one of the fish to keep and to recognize that it is not a prickly rockfish.  My prickly rockfish is my procrastination tendencies.  It is prickly but I am working around the prickly with sticking to my goals and writing down my to-do lists and utilizing all the resources provided here at OSU to handle procrastination.  There are the weekly study guides and the ‘zero to success in 77 days’ and the four square of importance picture.  Wow!  The memories of everything we covered!  And now trying to regurgitate it so the good comes to mind more easily.  Whew!

The tools, downloads, in the Academic Success Center are keepers and I will continue to use them to track my progress and keep myself on track.  I just have to keep at it on a daily basis until it becomes so ingrained that it is a part of me.  It’s getting easier.

I was so glad to get to know our library resources so much better and that is definitely a keeper…..  hmmmm, I have to research and find what kinds of fish pelicans like better than others.  Although my learning styles (I have two main ones) do not include the visual so much, I am thinking that pictures of pelican-favored fish would be a good reminder of where to place my focus each and every day….much like a to-do list.  That sounds good.  So, with my fisheries and wildlife degree in mind, I would say that utilizing the library research tools is high on my list of OSU resources to name one of those fishes.

Goals: Goals: Goals: what do pelicans think of goals?  At dawn, do pelicans think about where they will be come sundown?  Do they calculate how many fish they must or will get during the day?  At the end of the day, do they sit back and pull one foot up and think to themselves how good or bad the day was? The answer is “no.”  But that is what I have been doing and will continue to do each and every day.  It is how I figure the success of my day and approach the next.  I’m an optimist and do not count a poor choice as making a bad day.  I just move on: I suppose a pelican does that too.  If the pelican missed the fish on that swoop into the water, he or she does not go mope on the beach and bemoan its bad day.  That’s me…..just pick back up and go again.  That’s my goal: to keep going back in and succeed the next time.  That’s where I am at with it all: daily goals to reach the end of the term and go on to the next term.

It’s not easy overcoming the bad habit of never having set major goals for my life.  I never saw it exemplified nor did I understand the need.  But now I understand and I have seen the successful examples of others like Randy Pausch and my classmates (and myself) who are completing this class.  One major goal accomplished!

Anyway, I have gone on a long time.  So I thank you for continuing to read what I’m saying.  So as a final note, I have set a long-term goal of losing weight with smaller goals set to check my progress at 2, 3 and 6 months and daily goals of exercise (with a day off on Sunday).  These are the things I have learned to do in order to accomplish my goals: especially my big fish named post-bac degree in Fisheries and Wildlife at OSU.