E-Portfolio Site

Link to site: Kayla Wong's E-Portfolio

INTRODUCTION:

Hi my name is Kayla Wong, and I’m an undergraduate student at Penn State University Park (class of 2015). I would like to provide you with an introduction about me, and my academic endeavors. 

 

I came to Penn State with a clear understanding of what I wanted to study, and what my career would be once my educational studies were completed. As a sophomore in high school, I had added responsibility of caring for my younger cousins who were placed in my home through the foster care system. I’ve witnessed them go through so much physically, and emotionally, and it didn’t seem fair that kids so young had to face so much hardship. I thought about all the other children who had dealt with similar circumstances, and I knew that my career would involve helping young children who were living in non-stable growing environments. From that moment on, I knew that I wanted to contribute to the world by helping young children in the field of psychology. In my first year at Penn State, I’ve taken an array of courses ranging from anthropology, to statistics, and even Chinese. None of my classes have failed to teach me something knew, interesting, or guide me to perceive things differently and with an open mind. After taking a variety of courses, I have realized that I love learning about the mind, and what influences people’s behaviors. My psychology courses, and specifically my child development courses, has taught me so much about the ways in which people conduct themselves and helped me to understand why people behave or interact in particular ways. I’m always amazed at the new things I learned in child development because it teaches us about our lives from the very start and ways in which we go through a variety of developmental stages of growth, but still remain unique individuals. My college academic experience has allowed me to deeply think about my values and beliefs, continuously develop my views on society, and each semester brings me a step closer to pursuing my career.

Change in a Decade

"Kids born in the 90s have lived to see 3 decades, 2 centuries, 1 millennium, and most of us aren't 21 yet" (online quote). I was born in the 90s, raised thought the 90s and early 2000s, and it feels like I have live a completely different life. There has been so many changes since I was a child, in terms of fashion, trends, an array of new acceptance (race and gender wise), and a major and rapidly changing technological transformations. Many peers within my age group witnessed the change from house phones to smart phones, and for a large part most of us feel comfortable with technology in ways that our parents might not, and the younger generations will never understand. But for some reason, the 90s is commonly refereed to as a "simpler time" and there is just so much that we miss about the 90s and it truly wasn't so long ago. It seems like a far beyond time, but even with such advanced and efficient technological changes, we still yearn for the past experiences we had without them, and its crazy to imagine that my younger sister may never get to experience the great 90s that I miss so much.

The 90s seemed like best of times, our parents dressed and dressed us in things we would never be caught dead in today, we have special pop artist like N'sync and Spice Girls, our large array of television shows that are so much different than the ones today, and those simple toys we had that we could play with for hours and they did so little compared to the Xbox 360 game system. I know I miss the 90s, and I truly feel like that time and the essence of that time is apart of my character and the shared character of all of us early 90s babies. Maybe I can't return to the 90s, but I can re-vist my favorite part of my youth, and re-live it with my favorite television shows. With youtube and its large array of playlist collections, I can simply type in 90s shows, and watch my favorite seasons of Kenan & Kel, Recess, Rugrats, Hey Arnold, Animaniacs, Doug, All That, A Different World, and so many more. I just love going back and re-watching and remembering how excited I was to watch it on my once huge television thats now a flatscreen. It seemed to me that the style of the shows back then are so much different from the shows that they make for kids today. I watched some later television and family shows, and it was interesting to me how they would approach topics about teens and drugs or other family issues, and how they played out on the shows and then were discussed as an important issues after. It seemed like it was at that time, there was such a greater connectedness an need to examine issues as a socitey. When I watch reality shows and other television programs today, the ways in which they present topics and handle situations is now done for laughs and shows like "Jersey Shore" just seem to "kill my brain cells" because I feel like there is no more "messages" and "connectedness" that there once was on television shows. I've realized that in a short amount of years, our television programing has gone so far off of invented creativeness and with the larger variety of shows, it takes up a lot more time in our day just sitting around than being as active as we were in the 90s. I understand that we can't change our programming to be fitting to the 90s but looking back at all of our shows at that time, tells a lot about the logos of style about how programming has changed, and how the differences affect the ways in which we counteract in our society.

Anticipating the Birthday

The closer it gets to our birthdays, the more we anticipate the day and how we will celebrate it, or at least I do. The minute March approaches, I always start thinking about things I want as gifts, things I'll do, and the people I'll hear from. Being away from home and at college, somehow I anticipated that this birthday would be more special. After turning 19 this wednesday, I realized how much more special spending birthdays with my family members was. This birthday turned out a lot more different than I expected. Coming down with the flu the night before, I realized that this birthday wouldn't be as joyous as the rest. I barely made it to classes, and the only thing I wanted to do was sleep. I thought back to what it would be like celebrating at home, and how my grandmother would make be soup and cater tea until she felt at ease with my health. I also considered the fruit cake my grandma always made me, and no East commons cupcake could compare. I missed waking up to my mom surprising me with things I've always wanted but never directly asked for. Being sick in bed on my birthday was unfortunate, but it was everyone else's response or blessing of how that day should have been for me that made me homesick.

Like my mother, I always understood that my birthday is just a normal day like any other in the year, so I don't consider there to be some major life changing event that happens once I become a year older. Everyone called me to wish me, "an amazing day," "a crazy night," "one of the best days of the year," and "a beautiful day." I sat there reading my facebook birthday notifications, and all I could think was it was the complete opposite of what I anticipated it to be, as well as what my family and friends anticipated that day for me. Walking back from class I was stuck in a penn state bizarre and random hail storm, and I became so sick that I didn't want to leave my bed. It was the birthday comments that said a lot about peoples relationships with me, that spoke to the ethos of my character. I have so many cousins, and rather than them just wishing me a great day I got, "I miss you so much," "I wish you were home," "remember when we did this..." And my favorite of all was the pictures my younger sister posted of us, making my birthday wish to just be home with them. I loved explaining to my baby sister about being a teen and how that was different than being an adult. I think the ways in which people spoke on our relationship or my character was the logos in which it influenced how I responded to them and considered the importance of celebrating my birthday, or just my 19 years of experiences and memories.

Our Daily Bread

I've always enjoyed being apart of a community, and working to advance my community in any way I can. Since middle school, I have taken part in multiple community service opportunities ranging from planting flowers, to hosting a christmas party for kids in shelters escaping abuse. Each time I find that not only do I enjoy community service, but especially when it involves making other people happy, I love it more. As a freshmen I've only recently taken part in two community service opportunities at Penn State, and I hope to take on a lot more. The first was the Martin Luther King Day of service where we counted out stamps and sent boxes to stamp collectors. Again I felt good in being able to make someone happy, but my latest community service act seemed to change my outlook on service. I always felt like I was making someone else feel better in my community, but this time I realized it was so much more.

This wednesday for the first time, I went to help out at St. Paul's church for their bread basket. When I first went to the church, even though I was there to help out, because it was early, they made sure to feed me and show me around the kitchen. My job for the day was really simple, just to fill the water pitcher and carry the used dishes to the kitchen. While I ate, I sat with other students, some were foreign penn students, and others graduate students (so I haven't ever met them before). I also socialized with the other elderly people who came in. The man who was showing me around the kitchen stressed how much more my part in community service was effective in socializing rather than working. And after talking to other students about their majors and where they were from, I learned that he was completely right.

One graduate student who I found out was also a psychology major like me, told me about the importance of starting lab research early on. He didn't start until his graduate schooling, and thought that I should take his mistakes and start early on in my schooling with labs, and told me about the vast amount of undergraduate lab opportunities and students needed for them. Being from Mexico, he also asked me about New York City, and I learned how mind bottling the city appeared to other people. Most of all, this was the first community service opportunity where I learned that I could take away and learn so much more in my experiences and that it was not just about helping others feel happy.