Final Reflection on Learning

I love that this modules gears towards practical training; it focuses on honing our communication skills instead of placing the emphasis solely on academic writing.This is probably the biggest thing that I can take away from the module because effective communication is definitely essential when we enter the workforce in the future. In a professional setting, we can write the best essays or churn out the most comprehensive statistical analysis, but if we are unable to communicate effectively with our colleagues and bosses, how are we able to survive in the workforce in the long run or achieve bigger things?

This course has provided a good coverage of various components of effective communication, which includes active listening, interview and resume writing skills and survey research skills to name a few. I feel that these are very practical skills that we will be using in the workforce in future. While companies have to pay thousands of dollars to send their employees for such communication courses, I feel privileged to be able to get exposed to these skills in a learning environment so as to improve my communication skills.

Delivering a professional presentation does not require talent. It only requires practice and exposure, as seen from how the class has made vast improvements during our final presentation. I am indeed thankful for the numerous opportunities given to us to deliver oral presentations, as well as for the feedback sessions after our presentations. It is through the various feedback that we learn from one another, to be more aware of our strengths, as well as to improve on our own weaknesses.

My experience with this course will not have been so memorable without our encouraging lecturer and supportive classmates. The responsiveness and camaraderie of the class made the whole learning process very fulfilling because we had the opportunity to learn from one another's experiences.

To Qukui, my partner for peer teaching, it was great working with  you. Thank you for laughing at Liverpool because it taught me how to laugh at them as well. To Liying, WeiRong and Lin Han, you are such a humourous bunch of people to work with. I had so much fun working with you. Thank you for always being so understanding and accomodating.

Left to Right: Grace Yee & Qukui

Left to Right: Wei Rong, Lin Han, Liying, Grace Yee & Dr Radhika

To the class, although we cannot deny that being awarded marks for class participation motivates us to speak up in class, thank you for being so genuine and frank with your comments and feedback. I have learnt a lot from all of us and I hope the rest of us feel the same way too. Thank you for being such a responsive and enthusiastic class that makes the whole learning process so enjoyable and memorable.

To Dr Radhika, thank you for being such an encouraging lecturer and for all the advice/tips you gave. Thank you for making lessons so enjoyable, for always engaging the class and encouraging us to participate, as well as to let us know the areas which we can improve on.

Last but not least,  thank you for all your comments on my blog posts. I am guilty of not responding to them, but be rest assured that I've read all of them. Thank you for taking the time to give me such substantial and useful advice, which I will definitely bear in mind when the situation arises.

It has been a very fulfilling journey. This class is by far the most memorable for me. I will definitely miss all of you. As we go forth in our different endeavours, let us remind ourselves to constantly practise effective communication. We have learnt its importance in the professional setting; let us not forget that effective communication happens with our friends and family too! :)    

Reflection on Oral Presentation

There were three oral presentations that we had to make throughout this course.
For each presentation that I made, I always discovered that there were different aspects that I could improve on.

The first one served as a trial run for which Qukui, Lara and I were tasked to present on the various aspects of nonverbal communication. For this presentation, all three of us created our own PowerPoint slides and we had to open three different files on the day itself in order to make the presentation. In addition, all three of us used different backgrounds for our slides.

Mine looked like this:

The feedback from the audience was that they felt that the switching of files and the different background designs were distracting for them. Hence, we were encouraged to combine our slides together and to use a common background.

Personally, I remember being encouraged to make more substantial eye contact and to make less hand gestures. These comments helped me to be more aware of myself because I was never conscious about my excessive use of hand gestures and the lack of eye contact.

I believe that the strengths of my presentation lay with the use of visuals for my slides and good voice projection. I also felt that my delivery was generally smooth and confident.

The second presentation was made for the purpose of peer teaching, for which Qukui and I presented on Intercultural Communication. For this presentation, I decided not to follow the conventional style of using PowerPoint slides. Instead, I made use of the whiteboard for my presentation. The strength of this is that it is something fresh and different; the weakness of this is that if the whiteboard is not utilised properly, it can end up making the audience feel lost and confused.

Ironically, I remember feeling lost myself when I was making the presentation. I somehow felt that I was losing focus of my direction. I think it was something I had overlooked while planning and practising. Another aspect that I had overlooked was the presentation style of my points on the whiteboard. My points were splashed rather messily across it. Hence, it was rather difficult for the audience to focus and follow my points. 

I took back many learning points from this particular presentation and it was indeed an interesting experience. I am glad that I took the courage to try something different. 

The final presentation of this course was for our proposal to solve the overcrowding issue in NUS canteens during lunch peak hours. For this particular project, i was grouped with Liying, Wei Rong and Lin Han. For this presentation, we used Powerpoint slides accompanied with an additional item to bribe the audience to be kind and nice.

 

  
What better to way to capture the hearts of the audience than food? I'm kidding about that. :) We decided to bring in food samples to class to illustrate our proposal on bringing in external vendors to set up outlets selling takeaway food solely.

Besides our ability to make the audience hungry so that they are compelled to ask less questions in order to get their hands on the food items, I believe the strengths of our presentation lay with a very strong topic, organised points which were accompanied with appropriate visuals and team unity. It was heartwarming to see that we stood together and echoed one voice especially during the Questions-and-Answers portion.

These are several photos which we captured for the purpose of the presentation, in order to highlight the severity of overcrowdedness in the canteens during lunch peak hours.

The Deck at the Arts & Social Science Faculty

Frontier at the Science Faculty

Techno Edge at the Engineering Faculty

On the downside, a couple of us were feeling under the weather on the day of our presentation. My body decided to crumble during that period and I was feeling unwell that day. I felt off-from and thought that my presentation was not up to par. I felt that my voice sounded nasal and thought that it would affect my voice projection. Despite that, I was very touched and ecnouraged to receive good comments from the audience.

Overall, I would consider our final presentation a job well done which could only be achieved because of our team spirit and the amount of practise we had put in. It is a sheer joy working with the team who is ever humourous and accomodating. Who else can I laugh with over minute things like chicken chop and the use of utensils? :)

Last but not least, I woud like to thank everybody for their feedback and comments on my presentation. They sure did spurr me to improve my presentation skills! :)