Getting to know CAT
Hi PMO here today’s topic is Getting to know CAT.
Competencies
Abilities
Talents
What is CAT? Competencies, they are necessary skills I need in life, the basic skills.
Abilities are the things which will help you in your life and you enjoy it. Talents and interests are what drive one in their life, something that makes my life. Together they make CAT.
Discussion on competencies: What are competencies? Once we learn some competency we don’t forget it for example if I learn reading english I do not forget it. Competencies can be learnt in many ways, for example we learn languages by books, we also learn it by just listening or by just staying with people who speak a certain language. Do we have to have competencies? We need competencies because they are skills I need to live my life, for example I can live my life without knowing swimming but I can’t live without knowing basic calculations in maths. Competencies is not subjects or curriculums. In Aarohi some of us do take subjects and use textbooks but it’s not only a subject vise learning. How do we approach these competencies? Normally I as an individual would like to work on it in my day to day life and not separately so that I can make it my habit. Some would like to make learning the competencies fun. Some of us would like to work on it separately and then apply it in day to day life. We could track /evaluate our status on the competencies. Some of us think we should learn a set of competencies before a certain age. Sometimes when we don’t learn a competency we realise at a certain point and then we learn it and apply it in day to day life.
Discussion on abilities: What is abilities? Normally we choose to work on abilities which are related to our talent or interest. Sometimes we just work on any random ability. Abilities are something which adds joy to our life but for some people it may not. How do we choose an ability and how it helps us/ does not help? Some of us choose the ability related to our interest, for example my interest is football so I develop fitness and flexibility. If we want to pursue our passion it is critical to identify what all abilities we need and develop it as soon as possible. We can expand the whole scope of our interest by exploring abilities. Sometimes we get inspired and then we think that I need this ability. Sometimes being aware of what we are doing helps us in developing our abilities.
Discussion on talents and interest: What is talents and interests? Some of us think that finding talents and interests is life. Interest is something which seeks you. Talents are a certain set of things that you are good at. Should we develop our interest or should we find more interests? We sometimes understand the interests and then find out more about it. Interests can also be an attraction example a movie, a camera, a book which you read etc. How do we identify interests that are strong and interests that we have for a short period of time?. When we have interests that are short we just drop it at sometime. Can we leave our interest and then start it again? Yes, because when you lose interest in the thing it’s like doing it by force.When you get interested again you would really want to work on it and you would do it with passion. Some of us think that changing our interest should not become a habit. Some of us think that parents worry about that too early but as they grow older they tend to stick to one thing. Just like a butterfly they jump from one flower to another (interest) and when we grow big like a bee we dig deep for honey (interest developing).What roles can the adult play or what they play? They give us guidance. They provide us with unconditional support/ trust. They can do different things in the task. They can help us explore other aspects of our interests. Help us stay confused and they push us to do our work.
Discussion of CAT between home and campus: How do we follow this at home or in campus. CAT gives us clarity between parents facilitators and children. How we do this? Portfolio, documentation, cat maps and discussion. Parents can also maintain a documentation of life with their child at home.
A quotation: “Cats know how to obtain food without labour, shelter without confinement, and love without penalties”
We have discussed about this and now it is time for you to ponder more about this
THANK YOU