Blog #4 Final Reflection on Learning

Over the course of this module, ES2007s, I believe that it has gradually trained me to be a better communicator. As a statistic major student, I have little presentation opportunities and these are limited to tutorial presentations where students merely scribbled their derived mathematic answers on the board and mumbled what they wrote, either presenting it to the floor or the board, never the audience. That was the way we “presented”. Since presentations are not graded and that no emphasis is placed on the importance of presentation, there is simply no incentive for us to work on our presentation skills. In addition, many of us will probably only deal with data in our future jobs. However, studying for a business minor requires me to present well as strong emphasis is placed on presentations in business modules. This semester, I had a total of 6 business presentations and I was really fortunate that ES2007s’ peer teaching came before any of them. This allowed me to be able to practice and improve before my competitive business presentations, where almost everyone presents like a professional. Therefore, the biggest takeaway from this module will definitely be the many presentation opportunities given, especially peer teachings, the improvements I have made and skills I have learnt, over the course of this module.  

Learning from Peer teachings:

Challenges faced and skills improved on:

·       Since the duration of peer teaching covers the entire tutorial, it was the longest presentation I ever gave and it had the largest amount of content I ever covered over a presentation. Initially, I had difficult trying to remember my script since there were a lot to remember but after much manipulation, I managed to include the various key words into my slides which not only serves to draw my audience’s attention to the key points but also serves as a cue and prompt to guide my presentation smoothly.

Thus, I’ve learnt the usefulness and importance of effective slides and how to create such slides to better facilitate presentations to both the presenter and the audience.

·       The other challenge I faced is the ability to facilitate understanding of my peers on the content I was teaching. I have probably asked myself numerous times throughout my preparation if there was a better way to deliver my peer teaching to allow them to not only understand but also retain what I have taught in my peer teaching session. After much consideration, I decided that teaching through examples then applying what you have learn straight away and ending with a recap is the most effective way to deliver what I want my audience to know. During my presentation, my method was proved effective when my audience are able to apply the techniques they have learnt effectively by writing awesome bad letters with my given scenarios, and I could not be any happier. Through this I have learn the techniques to giving an effective peer teaching or rather presentation and I firmly believe this will be of great use in the workplace in future!

Overall skills learnt: Skills learnt from peer teachings come from the topics I covered, the experiences gained and also the comments given by my facilitator, Mdm Fazilah, and from the classmates in the peer review. I have learnt the importance of the use of gestures and eye contact while presenting to draw your audience attention to key points or to better illustrate certain points and to reach out to them respectively. Furthermore, I also learnt the how I should vary in intonation to make my presentation more convincing and interesting, and to smile more to exude a friendlier vibe during my presentation. All these are valuable skills learnt and I truly appreciate the various comments given and the experiences themselves. Lastly, I would like to thank Mdm Fazilah and my classmates for making ES2007s such a pleasurable and fruitful experience in my last semester of my undergraduate studies. Thank you!

Blog #3 Reflection on Project Proposal-challenges, triumphs, learning points, possible improvements for the next group project

Triumphs:

I shall start by thanking my group members, most of whom are really initiative and motivated individuals and I am really glad I got to work with this energetic bunch in my last semester of school. Thank you all for standing behind my ideas, and all of your further contributions to them, improving my initial suggested solution to such a wholesome one at the end of each project meeting we had. Overall, I would say that we never fail to have an efficient project discussion every single time we met. Time and again, our impeccable teamwork, mutual understanding and chemistry unquestionably steered us to one of the most productive, rewarding and enjoyable project I have ever had.

Project Proposal Challenges and Learning points:

1    At the start of our first project discussion, being creative individuals, we were all just swamped with numerous possible project topics to take on, though not all were feasible. As it was our first time working together, everyone was being nice to not reject or put down the ideas of others’. Thus, we had a little difficulty settling down with a final project topic.

Learning point and improvement: To facilitate a productive discussion in future, we need to learn to tactfully reject impractical or unsuitable ideas by either further clarifying the project requirement or explaining its unsuitability to attain mutual understanding. This will not only allow us to be sensitive to each other feelings but also enable an efficient discussion.  

Challenges 2 and 3 arrive at the same learning point and improvement.

2    One challenge we faced was the communication of assigned work. Though there was a slight misunderstanding, it was quickly resolved through open clarification whenever there were doubts. Effective teamwork is also key in resolving misunderstanding and my group certainly displayed such a quality whenever a problem arises, with initiative and helpful group members standing up to take control of the situation.

3   One possible challenge we would have met with if a clear timeline was not set will definitely be project time management. Minutes made during the discussion did a fantastic job of assisting all of us with our responsibilities, reminding us of various deadlines to be met and the necessary preparations for the next discussion.

Learning point and improvement: This has affirmed the importance of minutes during and after project discussion. I strongly recommend that in future discussions, all clarification should during the discussion so that an effective minute can be formed to better assist the project group members in the process of the task and thus effectively preventing any misunderstanding of the content of the minutes.

4    Things never go according to plan during presentation. It could be due to our lack of opportunity to rehearse together, the lack of communication and understanding of each other’s presentation or nervousness.

Learning point and improvement: Through the presentation, I learnt the importance of informing other group members of changes made to one’s part prior to the presentation so that every member have a clear knowledge of the flow of the presentation, especially time management. As students in NUS, we all have tight schedules with many other assignments and projects taking place concurrently. However, members need to make personal effort to ensure that due diligence is done on their parts. Communication is definitely essential so that every member understands the importance of the presentation to other members.

All in all, communication, mutual understanding and time management are keys to the success of any projects and I will definitely ensure that these are adopted in future projects. This is also applicable to future project discussion in the workplace, though more emphasis has to be place on the above qualities discussed, as we will be working with people from a diverse background and age group. Thus, I am grateful for this experience for it has prepared me in many little ways towards the art of effective communication.