Yesterday was my last day of Term 1, and damn has the term gone by fast!
It hasn’t really hit me yet that I’ve already finished 1/4 of the school year, but maybe that’s because I was stuck at home isolating for the last week of school, since I tested positive with covid19 last Sunday.
Anyway, looking back on this term, I’ve had a lot of mixed emotions and gone through a lot of new experiences. To break it down for you a little, here are some of my highlights for this term:
highlights of term 1
- connecting with new people (rhiannon, ethan p, diluk, owen, vasu, imogen, evelyn and meaghan)
- meeting and bonding with my new class 10F
- completed (and somehow survived) all my assessments
- joining premier band
- continuing to participate in extra curricular groups, eg. media team and the newsletter team
- learning new skills such as:
- technical drawing (graphic tech)
- how to use adobe illustrator (design and tech)
- extracting dna from strawberries (biology; science)
- how to play lawn bowls (pass)
- socialising with my friends during school
- indoor niagara (wednesday school sport)
- getting into my first relationship + first kiss
Term 1 was definitely an “introduction” into what my future schooling years are going to be like; rough and quickly paced. Even though I did have a few great moments, there were some pretty low ones too:
low moments of term 1
- struggling with really bad anxiety
- fast paced classes (graphic tech and science)
- not being able to pick up or understand concepts quickly
- missing out on 2 weeks of school due to covid/isolating
- procrastinating + building bad study habits
- sleeping late
- not being able to balance the different areas of my life (school > me)
- high levels of stress and anxiety due to assessments
- so much to do, so little time
Something I’ve realised in these past two years, is that the first 2 terms of school are usually the worst or the hardest for me. I think this is because it takes me a while to adjust my life and my routines to fit a new school workload, meaning that I have to figure out everything else around school.
I had a hard time completing my assessments this term because there was so much to do in so little time. I had 7 or 8 assessments due in the span of 3 weeks, so it was really, really hectic. Even still, I somehow ended up procrastinating some assessments (ehem my english speech) and only completed it the day before it was due.
The transition to Year 10 hasn’t been a smooth one, and it’s been really difficult to do my best knowing that everything from now on matters. Talks about the future, about our careers, university, and especially about the HSC has come up very frequently in conversations, and that’s put so much extra, unneeded pressure on me. I’ve already begun to feel really anxious and nervous about this year, and my last two years of high school, and I’m scared that this fear is going to hold me back from enjoying the time that I have with my friends, family and most importantly, by myself.
I’m so excited for these next two weeks of holidays, because I really need a break from school to revive and reset myself before Term 2 starts. I know it’ll go quickly, but I want to make the most of my free time while I have it. Hopefully I can improve my habits over this time as well, and build new, positive habits and routines that fit my lifestyle and help me balance my schedule better!
Au revoir term one! Only 3 more to go T-T
