ACTION
Black Kites Swimming Team: CAS (Action) Reflection
In this academic year, one of my largest participation and commitment in sporting activities is swimming. This is my third year as a member of the the Black kites swimming team, with significantly more participation than previous years. As one of the older members within the team, I contributed by helping out our junior members during the meets, such as reporting to events and during warmup. During the first season, I have achieved 1 gold, 3 silver and 1 bronze medal as well as grade A girls championships as a team in the Shatin and Saikung HKSSF championships, ISSFHK swim meets and the ISSFHK swimming championships in November 2014.
I have also had the honor to be chosen as a Shatin representative in the New Territories Swimming Championships 2014, achieving gold in Girls H Grade 4x50LCM freestyle relay.
One of my main goals in this CAS activity, is to increase awareness of my own strengths and areas for growth. This has not been the most successful year for in my swimming career, with minimal improvements in my best times in various events. I feel that one important factor that has affected my endurance and speed, is the lack of training. Due to the hectic life as an IB student, with heavy workload and other CAS commitments, I was unable to attend more than two training sessions out of school and one short training session in school each week. This has affected my performance during meets. Another fault that has showed up during competitions, are my strokes that affected my speed. The most obvious mistake is my breaststroke kick. The fault in my kick was a minor butterfly kick at the end of each breaststroke kick. The next fault this year is my diving trek start. My diving has been very high at each start. This is a problem that has remained for a long period of time. The last most obvious problem is the level of my endurance taking a dramatic fall within these few months. Again this would bring me back to the problem of the lack of training.
In order to fulfill the learning outcome of developing new skills, I have set up new goals to help me to so. The goal I have set up is to improve my strokes for all four strokes. The most important stroke I need to improve is breaststroke. This is important, as it would affect my individual medley events each time if I do not correct the stroke. I suggestion I have for myself for this goal is to keep my legs tight together each time and to stiffen my hip in order to prevent my legs from kicking an extra unnecessary butterfly kick after each stroke. The next stroke is butterfly. In my butterfly, I think that I should put my head down before my hands at the start of each stroke before the pull. This is a problem that has remained for a long time and cannot always be done. My goal here is to constantly remind myself to do so during all times. Next is my backstroke that I have too concentrate on. With backstroke, my goal is to constantly remind myself to keep my head straight and steady whilst swimming and to be more familiar with counting my strokes in to the wall for finishing and turns instead of moving my head to predict when and how many more strokes I would need before I complete the lap. Finally would be my freestyle. In this stroke, I generally have to remember all the different aspects of swimming a good freestyle stroke such as high elbows, powerful kicks, and strong pulls etc.
As mentioned in the beginning, I have also undertaken new challenges in roles outside of swimming. Through helping out with the senior captains, I have attempted to undertake the duty of a senior member in helping out junior members, marshaling, timing, leading warmup, as well as establishing a better relationship with coaches of the team. The most beneficial skill I have developed through this season, is leadership skills which can be beneficial for my future career.
The last learning outcome of this CAS activity, is to demonstrate commitment and preservation throughout the course of the activity. I feel that I have achieved this outcome through my love and interest for this sport. I have consistently attended one required training session in school with perfect attendance throughout the entire season, as well as a minimum of two training session with Win Tin swimming club despite our busy schedules. If I am unable to attend my designated training session, I have emailed my coaches in advance in request to participate in other training session.
In conclusion to this year’s performance, I feel that I have successfully acted as a risk-taker, undertaking new roles and developing new skills. Although I have demonstrated commitment in the activity, I was not entirely satisfied with my performance. There are many areas where I can improve on to achieve a higher level in next year’s performance.
In this academic year, one of my largest participation and commitment in sporting activities is swimming. This is my third year as a member of the the Black kites swimming team, with significantly more participation than previous years. As one of the older members within the team, I contributed by helping out our junior members during the meets, such as reporting to events and during warmup. During the first season, I have achieved 1 gold, 3 silver and 1 bronze medal as well as grade A girls championships as a team in the Shatin and Saikung HKSSF championships, ISSFHK swim meets and the ISSFHK swimming championships in November 2014.
I have also had the honor to be chosen as a Shatin representative in the New Territories Swimming Championships 2014, achieving gold in Girls H Grade 4x50LCM freestyle relay.
One of my main goals in this CAS activity, is to increase awareness of my own strengths and areas for growth. This has not been the most successful year for in my swimming career, with minimal improvements in my best times in various events. I feel that one important factor that has affected my endurance and speed, is the lack of training. Due to the hectic life as an IB student, with heavy workload and other CAS commitments, I was unable to attend more than two training sessions out of school and one short training session in school each week. This has affected my performance during meets. Another fault that has showed up during competitions, are my strokes that affected my speed. The most obvious mistake is my breaststroke kick. The fault in my kick was a minor butterfly kick at the end of each breaststroke kick. The next fault this year is my diving trek start. My diving has been very high at each start. This is a problem that has remained for a long period of time. The last most obvious problem is the level of my endurance taking a dramatic fall within these few months. Again this would bring me back to the problem of the lack of training.
In order to fulfill the learning outcome of developing new skills, I have set up new goals to help me to so. The goal I have set up is to improve my strokes for all four strokes. The most important stroke I need to improve is breaststroke. This is important, as it would affect my individual medley events each time if I do not correct the stroke. I suggestion I have for myself for this goal is to keep my legs tight together each time and to stiffen my hip in order to prevent my legs from kicking an extra unnecessary butterfly kick after each stroke. The next stroke is butterfly. In my butterfly, I think that I should put my head down before my hands at the start of each stroke before the pull. This is a problem that has remained for a long time and cannot always be done. My goal here is to constantly remind myself to do so during all times. Next is my backstroke that I have too concentrate on. With backstroke, my goal is to constantly remind myself to keep my head straight and steady whilst swimming and to be more familiar with counting my strokes in to the wall for finishing and turns instead of moving my head to predict when and how many more strokes I would need before I complete the lap. Finally would be my freestyle. In this stroke, I generally have to remember all the different aspects of swimming a good freestyle stroke such as high elbows, powerful kicks, and strong pulls etc.
As mentioned in the beginning, I have also undertaken new challenges in roles outside of swimming. Through helping out with the senior captains, I have attempted to undertake the duty of a senior member in helping out junior members, marshaling, timing, leading warmup, as well as establishing a better relationship with coaches of the team. The most beneficial skill I have developed through this season, is leadership skills which can be beneficial for my future career.
The last learning outcome of this CAS activity, is to demonstrate commitment and preservation throughout the course of the activity. I feel that I have achieved this outcome through my love and interest for this sport. I have consistently attended one required training session in school with perfect attendance throughout the entire season, as well as a minimum of two training session with Win Tin swimming club despite our busy schedules. If I am unable to attend my designated training session, I have emailed my coaches in advance in request to participate in other training session.
In conclusion to this year’s performance, I feel that I have successfully acted as a risk-taker, undertaking new roles and developing new skills. Although I have demonstrated commitment in the activity, I was not entirely satisfied with my performance. There are many areas where I can improve on to achieve a higher level in next year’s performance.
This year I have participated in these swimming events within the school: (Black Kites Swimming Team)
- ISSFHK Kellet/RCHK Senior Swimming Meet 2014
- ISSFHK ICS Senior Swimming Meet 2014
- ISSFHK AISHK Senior Swimming Meet 2014
- Hong Kong School Sports Federation Swimming Championships 2014 (HKSSF)- Shatin - Sai Kung Area
- 2014 ISSFHK Swimming Championships
- 2014 - 2015 RCHK Swimming Gala
- Inaugural Open Age Championships at RCHK
Participated Outside Events (Representing Shatin Team)
- New Territories Swimming Championships 2014
- ISSFHK Kellet/RCHK Senior Swimming Meet 2014
- ISSFHK ICS Senior Swimming Meet 2014
- ISSFHK AISHK Senior Swimming Meet 2014
- Hong Kong School Sports Federation Swimming Championships 2014 (HKSSF)- Shatin - Sai Kung Area
- 2014 ISSFHK Swimming Championships
- 2014 - 2015 RCHK Swimming Gala
- Inaugural Open Age Championships at RCHK
Participated Outside Events (Representing Shatin Team)
- New Territories Swimming Championships 2014
RCHK Rock Climbing Club
Rock climbing is a hobby which I have been passionate about for a over seven years, and seeing that our school has the resources to do so, I decided to run it as a CAS project, which would allow more people to experience this relatively rare sport in Hong Kong. It was a wonderful opportunity to have a chance to climb with others every week, regardless of the additional time required in order to prepare for the lessons in advance.
During this action opportunity, I physically challenged myself with different tasks each week. As there are various color-coded routes spreading across the climbing wall in school, I decided to challenge a route of higher difficulty each session. Despite that I was not always successful, and have yet to complete the most difficult route with the difficulty level of 7C, I did not give up. I faced each challenge with the same level of enthusiasm, reflecting on faults and areas of improvement to further refine my skills for future attempts.
Through this opportunity, I have learnt the importance of initiative and resilience, as I would have never had a chance to enjoy this activity and share my passion for it with others, if this rock climbing club was not initiated. Moreover, it felt great to break a sweat and work out each weak for stress relief.
Rock climbing is a hobby which I have been passionate about for a over seven years, and seeing that our school has the resources to do so, I decided to run it as a CAS project, which would allow more people to experience this relatively rare sport in Hong Kong. It was a wonderful opportunity to have a chance to climb with others every week, regardless of the additional time required in order to prepare for the lessons in advance.
During this action opportunity, I physically challenged myself with different tasks each week. As there are various color-coded routes spreading across the climbing wall in school, I decided to challenge a route of higher difficulty each session. Despite that I was not always successful, and have yet to complete the most difficult route with the difficulty level of 7C, I did not give up. I faced each challenge with the same level of enthusiasm, reflecting on faults and areas of improvement to further refine my skills for future attempts.
Through this opportunity, I have learnt the importance of initiative and resilience, as I would have never had a chance to enjoy this activity and share my passion for it with others, if this rock climbing club was not initiated. Moreover, it felt great to break a sweat and work out each weak for stress relief.
CAS Week Surfing
With my passion for swimming from a young age, it was natural for me to choose Bali as my year 12 CAS trip, which consisted of three full days of surfing and activities around the beach. In this activity, we were assigned to an instructor in groups of 2-3 person, allowing the instructor to closely attend to everyone of us.
Over the course of the three days, I attended intense three hour daily session surfing from 9 to 12AM as well as 1 hour of yoga exercises and stretches in the pool. Despite the intensity of the sessions, I demonstrated commitment and resilience through my enthusiasm, as I truly had an excellent experience in the ocean along my friends.
As I have never surfed before, this activity gave me an opportunity to undertake new challenges and develop new skills. Although I am a fairly strong swimmer, I rarely ever go into the ocean. Facing the mountainous waves on an unfamiliar surfboard, I eventually overcame my fear with the help of our instructor, allowing me to freely enjoy the pleasures of this water sports and acquiring the basic stills of surfing through this course.
With my passion for swimming from a young age, it was natural for me to choose Bali as my year 12 CAS trip, which consisted of three full days of surfing and activities around the beach. In this activity, we were assigned to an instructor in groups of 2-3 person, allowing the instructor to closely attend to everyone of us.
Over the course of the three days, I attended intense three hour daily session surfing from 9 to 12AM as well as 1 hour of yoga exercises and stretches in the pool. Despite the intensity of the sessions, I demonstrated commitment and resilience through my enthusiasm, as I truly had an excellent experience in the ocean along my friends.
As I have never surfed before, this activity gave me an opportunity to undertake new challenges and develop new skills. Although I am a fairly strong swimmer, I rarely ever go into the ocean. Facing the mountainous waves on an unfamiliar surfboard, I eventually overcame my fear with the help of our instructor, allowing me to freely enjoy the pleasures of this water sports and acquiring the basic stills of surfing through this course.
2014 - 2015 RCHK Athletics Carnival
During this year's athletics carnival, I participated in various track and field events, including 100meters sprint, obstacle course and vertex. I physically challenged myself with vertex, as I have never participated in this event previously. Despite not winning any personal events this year, Ming yet again won the annual championships, reinforcing the importance of participation and enthusiasm of a team. Through the various house events this year, it has taught me that it is not enough for one man to excel in a particular aspect, but rather having everyone contribute their efforts may be more effective. Overall, I had a wonderful time at sports day, giving me an opportunity to participate in an area which would not usually consider as my strength in order to step out of my comfort zone. Ultimately, it has given me an opportunity to create more treasurable memories with friends before the end of our high school experience.
During this year's athletics carnival, I participated in various track and field events, including 100meters sprint, obstacle course and vertex. I physically challenged myself with vertex, as I have never participated in this event previously. Despite not winning any personal events this year, Ming yet again won the annual championships, reinforcing the importance of participation and enthusiasm of a team. Through the various house events this year, it has taught me that it is not enough for one man to excel in a particular aspect, but rather having everyone contribute their efforts may be more effective. Overall, I had a wonderful time at sports day, giving me an opportunity to participate in an area which would not usually consider as my strength in order to step out of my comfort zone. Ultimately, it has given me an opportunity to create more treasurable memories with friends before the end of our high school experience.