LAST!!! Course reflection

Just before I draft this last post entry, I took a quick look at my first entry that sort of summarizing why I am taking this course. In short, I want to improve my language with a communication course. The coordinator of this module, BB sensei was my tutor in another module I took which is EG1471. Having a good impression with him I decided to enroll into his course while there are actually other communication courses offered by other departments such as Business, without looking at the detail of the course.

Again I am impressed with the course materials. It was fantastic and just browse through the list will be an eye opener that triggered me to learn the quality of a professional speaker. However there is something wrong as time goes by. The structure of the course is very similar with the other two courses that I taken from CELC: EG1471 and EG1413. The former is known as English of Education if not wrong. Taught by BB sensei, we need to post up blog entries on a regular basis, comment with each other post and conduct peer teaching. Sound familiar? Yes I am doing exactly the same thing two years before; the latter is known as Critical Thinking and Writing and one of the main objectives is to trained engineer with proposal writing skill based on secondary research. Yes I am doing a proposal again. In addition, I conducted twice primary survey in NUS for the CCA project I joined. The similarities are quite discouraging as I felt this is nothing new but a repetition.

Fortunately there are differences that delighted me. It was like adding flavoring for me to enjoy this course. I was exposed to the proper, correct, or as the name of the course suggest, a professional way for the topic covered. For instance, resume writing, interviewing, preparing unbiased survey and others which had never been my concern before. I started to look at the same thing in a different and thoughtfully manner. This is the most I gained from the course.

Let’s back to my origin of taking this course, did my language improved? I doubt there is hardly or any improvement and I believed you will sure spot quite a number of grammatical error. In fact, I think I am in disadvantage to taking this course in terms of final grading due to my weakness in language. So, I actually pre-allocated a SU option for this module at the moment I decided to take this. However, I did not compromise the quality of my work especially for group work project. CF and YZ, forgive me if there is any conflict….it is really a great experience to work with you two. Go go Choyobo!

Presentation reflection

As far as the presentation is concern, I think our team done a good job. We successfully delivered the message we want to convey based on our proposal.

Looking back to my performance, I would give myself a ‘satisfactory’ grade. Unlike many who are natural presenter, I am still at the infant stage or just slightly more than that. My body was tremble at the start every time when I present. I cannot stand on the stage unprepared and talk based on the slide…even though the slide is prepared by me without a pre-written script. Being well prepared or simply, keep practicing is the only key for me if I want to do a presentation. The rule is simple and I think it apply to all of us: the more you prepare and the better you can do.

Still, I am kind of overlooking my role as the first presenter. I focus solely on the content as my concern was to bring out the topic and prepare a stage for the next presenter. This was not wrong in principle, but I fail to cater for the most important part: attention catcher. I did not put in effort to find interesting factor such as video or comic. Some might argue that what is wrong in getting to the point right at the start but the key here is the type of audience. I cannot agree that the same presentation slide can be recycled every time without considering the audience group. From what I see none of our audience have the self-initiated interest as our proposal is mainly for hostel residents and that’s why attention catcher is important.

For the same token, we give out the chance for present our proposal to Dean of Student as quite a lot of refinement is needed and unfortunately we do not have the sufficient time for that. Moreover, I think our background study is just up to the level for this mock proposal but definitely not sufficient in the authorities’ points of view.

Lastly, I know that my biggest problem is still weak in the language itself. Mispronunciation, wrong choice of term and grammatical mistakes greatly affected my performance and my own confident. lol