Assalamualaykum wbt.
As most of you might know, I entered this not-so-new journey call Master's Degree study in Educational Psychology. Truth to be told, ever since COVID-19 hit Malaysia and ruined our face-to-face learning style, I have been feeling rather lonely in this journey. It is far from how my degree studies were. Although, completing degree studies in UNIMAS back in 2019 was tough but it was never this lonely. It's not that I don't have friends, I have many kind souls as classmates now, just that it's all about virtual connection now. I am one of those type of people who do not prefer virtual thingy because I connect deeper with people in reality.
Hence, I kept on losing my motivation along the way. Every day is a day where I have to remind myself of why I chose to pursue my studies. Sometimes, I browse Youtube for some motivational videos to get me to study. Sad right? But that was literally how I tried to get motivation. (Great, now it's raining heavily outside my dorm.....loading.....getting into the mood).
What adds to the problem is that I have anxiety. It switches itself on whenever my workload increases. When assignments keep coming on my way, I'll lose focus a lot frequently. I'll overthink about the assignments and then I'll get mind "fatigue" that eventually leads me to just lie on my bed or watch variety shows. It is hard to not overthink these days, because the picture of me disappointing myself in studies kept playing on my mind. There's another side effect of having anxiety, its like either I disconnect myself from people or I'll push (procrastinate) my works to the very last minute and produce bad work.
Okay, now I want to share something I found (re-found) and I want my future self to look at this back whenever I feel demotivated.
Last year, Allah allowed me to stumble upon a very beautiful soul named Dr. Putri Afzan Maria in the social media. From that moment on wards, I said to myself that, "I want to be like her!".
Things you would wanna know about her:
1. She studied Multimedia and IT in Universiti Teknologi Petronas. (which she designed and produced an interactive courseware for children)
2. Interested in Early childhood studies so she pursed Masters Degree in it in Leeds Metropolitan University, United Kingdom.
3. She obtained Ph. D. (Cognitive Science) from University of Sussex, Brighton, United Kingdom
((Hello? did that rang a bell? I studied Cognitive Science too! awww *touched))
4. Founder of KinderKaizen and Sri Aria Elementary School
((I am definitely going to try apply for job in KinderKaizen! Pray for me pleaseeee))
5. Advocate for Education Revolution, Play based learning and Empowering Parenthood.
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I just watched her short 13 minutes video about why she emphasizes on Play Based Learning and it just recharges my energy and motivation. She reminded me about how worrying our education system is in Malaysia and that's why we need people to advocate about it. Revolution in education.
I want to be in that circle of advocates. Since, I had a little experience being in the curriculum or education field it self, I saw many aspects of the education system that we adopt need to change. I saw how my students struggled in their learning journey-- they didnt get what they should be getting.
Dr Putri Afzan highlighted the 4 basic aspects that should be covered in a comprehensive education system, they are:
2. Emotional (EQ)
3. Mental/Cognitive (IQ)
4. Social intelligence
What about Spiritual Quotient (SQ)? She said, for SQ to be able to develop, we must first help children to develop their IQ and EQ. Then, SQ would follow in.
The problem with our education is that we neglect their EQ and we force them to focus on only the IQ and Physical. In addition to that, does our school really helps children to socialize the right way?
This is a very important issue because we can not deny the fact that children in Malaysia are facing delay in their development. And we also want the children to be someone who can adapt to changes in the future, someone who does critical thinking and reasoning well. Most importantly, someone with high rationality and have good personality (akhlak).
May Allah help us all in this pursuit. May Allah help us achieve our dreams.
May this Muneera remembers why she wanted to study -- To benefit people, to make positive change, to advocate for betterment.
Aamiin
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