I had my latest performance appraisal last week. I found I had a much easier time identifying areas of growth this time over last year after having gone through an accreditation visit for one of our programs. In the past, I would look at my current skillset, look at the friction points I was experiencing, and project forward a better future based on picking up some new skills or experience. This process is fine, but I realize the flaw is that the path you choose to develop in is not based on experience. It’s a guess about what might be helpful.
Contrast this to going through the accreditation process. To prepare for the performance appraisal, I reviewed the last year’s worth of information (my calendar, my one-on-one meeting notes, and notes I’ve taken about my job) and saw patterns of missed opportunities and under-performance. In these areas, I can reflect and see how if I had more skills or experience in these particular areas, I would have had a better time navigating the issues we faced.
Based on this backwards reflection (rather than guessing or projecting forward), I could more clearly articulate what I’m weak in and where I would gain the highest value in focusing on.
I think this marks for me the formal transition from the “start of career” phase to a more mature “middle career phase.” I have enough work experience and self-knowledge to draw meaningfully from, and that allows me to make smarter choices moving forward.
One hundred days ago, I gave an update and reflection on my experiences at the 900th consecutive day of learning German. I noted that a large part of the competency I felt was attributable to pattern-matching, and I feel that is largely still the case. I am reasonably adept at visual pattern-matching based on context when reading the language prompts. I am less adept at auditory matching due to me often using the app with the sound off. I can’t comment on my skill at writing, though I pair that with my skills in speaking, which is hard to judge because I’ve had so little practice at speed. There are a few prompts from the app to attempt speech, but outside of my trip to Germany in 2019, I’ve had no practical exposure to speaking German in a way that provides immediate feedback.
There is one other note in my use of the app over the last few hundred days that I would like to share. Once I reached the end of the new lessons in the app (that is, I completed all language levels and earned a level ranking at least once) I stopped most of the novel practice and switched goals to improve my ranking on the weekly language league board. This changed my interaction with the app dramatically – I optimized for experience point accumulation rather than language mastery in order to earn a high enough ranking on the language board to progress through the various levels until I sat in the diamond league for a few weeks. I will fully admit that this was not language learning but instead gaming the system. I would only practice low-level lessons where I maxed out my level to earn experience point (XP) bonuses for the lesson. When the app was updated and new (more difficult) lessons were rolled out, I switched to completing the same language story each day to reliably hit my XP requirements. Eventually, after sitting in the diamond league for many weeks, I felt no motivation to maximize my weekly XP grind, and so I allowed my league ranking to fall, and instead focused on the bare minimum maintenance of maintaining my streak.
Obviously, this is not language learning as was intended by the development of the app. Thus remains a question: if I’m not intending on using the platform as it was intended, is there any reason to keep the streak? The short answer is yes – I’ve built up enough of a pride in the raw number that to break the streak I’ve built over the last 1000 days (almost three years of consistent work) would make me feel terrible. So I plan to keep plugging away at the streak for the time being.
But I do feel it’s important to return to the intent of the app – to practice the skills and develop better fluency in the German language. I’ll keep with German for now so I can continue to impress my wife’s family overseas, though I should probably also devote time to learning French as it’s an official language of my country.
If my streak were to end today, I would feel happy with what I’ve accomplished. Even if I haven’t reached a point of truly feeling conversational, I had learned enough through the app to be able to contribute somewhat meaningfully when I was speaking with family overseas. That alone justified the investment of time I made.
It’s been a while since I’ve written one of these posts (last one was October 2018!). Since many people find themselves with some extra reading time, here is what I’m working through while staying safe at home.
With some extra time at home and wanting to ensure I’m using my perishable foods wisely to cut down on waste, I decided to finally crack this book that I bought for myself at Christmas. When it originally arrived, I was slightly disappointed to see it was less of a recipe book and more of a primer on cooking (which I stuffily thought I had already a good grasp on). However, I recently checked out Nosrat’s latest podcast miniseries, which endeared me to her instantly (she’s so bubbly and full of passion, it was infectious!). Then I checked out the Netflix series that was created based on this book. Then I set to work cooking a minestrone soup from scratch (taking some cues from Jamie Oliver’s YouTube channel) and channeled Nosrat’s thoughts on what makes food taste good. The soup was a hit here at home, and it’s given me the confidence to keep practicing.
Some friends and I started a book club just before the government started shutting things down in the province. Our first book was Jim Mattis’ military memoir, and I chose Gulliver’s Travels as our second read. I had first encountered the story as a child, then again in first year of undergrad when I had to read excerpts for a class. However I don’t think I’ve read the unabridged book in its entirety, so I’m trying to approach this read fresh and wrap it up before we meet later this week.
I’ve been experimenting with reading fiction in bed before I go to sleep. I found the practice worked well reading The Alchemist, so I decided to continue the practice by grabbing a copy of Pressfield’s Gates of Fire, a fictional telling of the Battle of Thermopylae. I chose this book because I learned in Mattis’s memoir that it’s one of the books on the US Marine Corps mandatory reading list for all enlisted soldiers, and it sounded interesting.
I mentioned while reflecting on my 2019 reading list that I’m gravitating more towards biographies and memoirs as of late, and when I was reminded that Savage released a book recently, I grabbed it on audiobook to listen to. I love Savage’s worldview when it comes to making, and I would jump at an opportunity to spend a day with him. I’ll have to settle for this book instead.
I was flirting with learning coding a little while back (also seems like a good skill to pick up now), so I had ordered this one since it had some good reviews. I didn’t buy it to learn coding itself, but because it was presented as a good primer for learning about the world/community of coding. It provides a quick overview of the history of coding and dives into a bit of the lives and psychology of people who devote themselves to coding. I also was interested by the section at the end where the author reflects on learning to code during the writing of the book. I’m only around 100 pages in, so I still have a bit more to go.
A Paramedic's Notebook 