PART I
Learning style is the process by which students usually comprehend, understand and interpret information. Due to different creation each and every person had to learn differently from others. Learning and understanding are affected by the mode of learning, time, age, subjects learned and also the technology that is being used. This makes everybody have his unique way of learning which differs from one person to another.by understanding on which style one prefers to learn using, it make it easy for him/her to understand without any difficulties. To explain this learning style, fours characteristics duly explained. Namely: activist, theorist, pragmatist and reflector.
Activist
This is a group of people who learn things by actively doing them by themselves. Their motto is can I try this out? What will be the outcome? They appreciate they don’t know solution and use that as a motivation source. They are like risk takers who would risk anything at their expenses so as to learn the new things. They are usually bias less and can move to any lengths to learn. This involves physical movements. Identified within a group of people is easy since they seem to be very active compared to others. If it is a group situation, they will seem to be the group key characters. They look like a source of energy in that group, if a problem arises, they will to be the first to try and find out the solution first. They seem disturbed very much if they can’t argue out a problem. Being actively and directly involved in a situation, they possess some characteristics in leadership, sportsmanship and acting.
Leaders like to be identified as the source of solution and will always want to be top of others, and the only way to be recognized is by taking the problems at hand and solving them in their ways. Recognition and appreciation are what drives them to greater boundaries. They like to lead people from the front and behind.
Another group of an activist is sports men and ladies. They learn to be the best by physically doing exercise to outshine others. Their everyday aim is to learn something new and improve where they were at last. Just like sportsmen, actors are also in this category since they have to try and practice to be the best in acting industry.
Theorist
This group of students who like to learn what they think is comfortable for themselves and disregard what they think don’t fit in their lifestyle. This group is not explosive in researching. They usually follow a well-structured program in their learning. They are a tidy group of learners who seems to follow a specific path in problem solving. They solve their problems systematically and assume this that may make them come out of their line of working as meaningless and non-helpful. They never rest until their work is perfect.
Pragmatist
They are experimenters. They usually put what they learn into reality. They try putting new ideas to see if they will work out. They are very patient as they take a time to experiment new ideas. They are very positive in search for information with a positive mind of success. They categorize everything as a challenge and always try to find a solution for each.
Reflector
This group can be described as risk averse people since they don’t like experimenting of what they want to learn. They seem to be comfortable learning from others. They ask them what happened. They tend to learn about an issue by looking at others who have happened to be in the same situation. They like working with someone who has an experience of what they want to learn. They will also like to read books, magazines, articles and dailies to be informed better. They are efficient data collectors where they will read, assemble data from various sources which they will use to get information.
Newcastle personality assessor stated that human characteristics and behavior can be classified into five groups.
Extroversion this is a group of individuals who are very explosive in researching, but they tend to be very individualistic because they like working alone and are very independent where they don’t like their way of working to be interfered by anyone. They only work for their gratification from outside. They like working in their unique way. They can fit to be theorist but also as an activist.
Neuroticism is a group of individuals who are posed with self-threat and tends to in situations that usually bring unnecessary risk to themselves. They have a general fear factor, negativity and suffer a lot in loneliness since sharing is a problem to them. They tend to by psychologically tortured by what they do and what they intend to do. They are just ordinary and don’t appear in a group of elites in solving basic life problems. They look depressed and unsatisfied in life.
Conscientiousness, this group of individuals is self-organized and directional in that what they do tend to well outlay. They are like theorist since they just follow what they think suits them and assume anything else that seems to mislead them. Authority is what they insert to their peers and seem always to be on top of them. They like leadership and solve their problem and expect others to follow them. They are activist in nature. They are thorough in what they do but also like new challenges to try and find out if they can solve them.
Agreeableness this is a group of individuals who are very compassionate of what they do, they always follow rules and regulations provided to them. They tend to be less temperamental, obedient but are not explosive in what they do since they tend to follow a structured program. Their decisions are usually complete and are competent group of individuals. Problem-solving as a group always seem to be hard. They lack authority and independence. Perfection is their motto.
Openness-this personality type is one that exhibits traits of wanting to learn and gain the new experience. They tend to like being involved in new day to day challenges. They are very innovative. They are very cooperative. Their weakness is that solving a problem individually tends to be a challenge but given a platform of group discussion, they tend to solve a problem efficiently and very fast due honesty also
Part II
CAREER AND CAREER DEVELOPMENT
Career is an attitude, direction taken towards work-related activities which identify someone with what seems to suit him currently and in whole life. It determines our entire life. To make life enjoyable, one must structure his or her career well. Career development should be a personal challenge. It is a move to a person’s aspirations in life. Many learners seem to be very informed when it comes to what that they should undertake. They are usually unable to do a self-evaluation on what they are capable of doing. They seem to be much uninformed.
They do not discover their careers at a young age and try to sharpen those skills when young. A career path should start while at a tender age where parents have the responsibility of discovering what their children tend to do most, what they like doing. What they aspire to be when they grow up. Many children tend to land to the unwanted careers and discover late when they are already suffering in them. Career planning and development should be lifetime planning from when a kid is born until he becomes of age. Career development has been categorized into two types. Personal career development means giving all mental, physical and social strength growth to personal growth in life aspirations. Also, organizational career development plans are where organizations may decide to bring an incentive and programs to their employees.
Personal career development usually evolves the following stages:
- Self-evaluation and awareness- this stage usually involves the first thought of aspirations. It acts as seed money for starting a business. A person lists down what he or she would like to do in life. What ones feel flexible interested in doing. One will reach a conclusion if he knows who he or she is, what motivates him. The big determinant here will be one’s abilities and capabilities which will set and pave way for the career development process.
- Personal Assessment – at this stage, there is a broad list realized in stage one. After listing down what one finds to be in his interests will involve him or her to assess if the environment, social, economic and political factors will allow him in trying in doing what he wants. Like nuclear science student will find it hard to adjust and pursue his career in it if his country is against nuclear weapons assembly. This may contribute to personality strength like faint hearted individual may be challenged if he tries to develop his career on most medical courses. Also, you will be able to categorize on which ones will be of better interest by their intensity.
- Investigation and planning- this stage will involve checking of factors that hinder success or failure in the career chosen. They will include institutions availability; the duration one will take while in school, the cost to accrue, are there financial assistance e.g. scholarship and job vacancy availability in the market.
- Action plan and development- this is stage is a most critical stage where one will plan when and where to attend school. One will be able to source out finances to enable him or her pursue in the career one chose. It will enable him to attend training, schools to get educated about the career one chose. One will attain the skills that will enable him or her to fully complete the cycle in by putting aspirations to real action. These skills will act as the tools to make one successful, competent and competitive in the job market environment.
- Job search- after duly getting trained and acquiring the skills, one will have to enter the job market. On career training will not be enough to be successful in the career but will entail other factors like communication skills.
- Career management – this stage where people discover if choose the right careers. After entering in the job market and doing what the company hired them for, one will need to lay out strategies that will help him or her stay in the market for long. Careers nowadays are evolving at a high rate due to technological change and discovery of new ways of doing things. Thus, if one is not too careful maybe locked out. It will require one to be attending training workshops to sharpen his skills. It will involve revisiting the goals that you set when choosing the career and see whether you have attained them.
Organizational career development plan will be more of organization goals and not personal. The organization will do a self-assessment and note the goals gap available and will identify employees who can help in sealing them. They will initiate a training program whereby employees will be trained on skills to help the organization seal the gap between actual company position and the desired position. The organization will do a review. Career development process should be continuous throughout some one’s life.
