Critical Reflection

At the start of this module, I set goals for myself to improve my confidence and my public speaking skills. I wanted to be able to give a great presentation without coming across as nervous and messing it up. Professor Brad frequently offered the class the chance to read aloud in order to improve our speaking abilities. At first, I was anxious about speaking in front of a crowd and frequently struggled to project my voice loudly enough for the class to hear. I dreaded going to class since I had a hard time getting over my fear of public speaking and socializing because I found it difficult to interact with others, especially when we had a lot of group projects. But as time went by, I gradually gained courage by practising speaking up in class, and I was able to complete my presentation without much trouble. I was grateful as everyone was friendly allowing it to be easier for me to open up. Throughout the whole module, we were given constructive feedback on our work by Professor Brad and my peers. This gave me the opportunity to assess my strengths and areas for improvement, as well as what I did well so that I could build on them. In addition, it serves as a good motivation to be given compliments on something that I did. Effective communication is definitely a skill that I have to acquire to use in group projects or in the future workplace. There would be many occasions when I have to deliver speeches or presentations in the future which have to be clear and direct so as to prevent any miscommunications and ambiguity.

I think one of the most significant aspects that I take away from the project learning segment is teamwork skills. We focused on each others’ strengths to assign each individual role. For the technical report, while assigning parts by ourselves,  we had to apply the Paul-Elder critical thinking framework to write the report. We have to go through the source chosen to fully understand it before we can apply and analyse the information. As we propose and come up with our idea as a solution to the problem, we can then test and evaluate it. Our team was responsible and worked on the report even when we did not assign any parts for certain sections. Furthermore, we had to search for resources online by using the proper keywords and utilising the appropriate websites which we learned from in the micro module. 

I learnt various important tips for presentation such as how to transit between members. While preparing for my individual part of the presentation, I realised that I had to break the bad habit of using “now I will pass my time to…” as it was an inaccurate and not professional way. Before having this module, I used to be scared of presentations as I thought presenters had to use very complicated words but after having this module, I realised as long as it is explicit and easy for the audience to comprehend, I will be able to deliver a good presentation. 

I would like to thank Professor Brad for making this module engaging and enjoyable, I had many chances to interact and work with different kinds of people. Furthermore, I would also like to thank all of my partners and group members for being cooperative and encouraging; initiating and having a strong sense of responsibility when it comes to group projects and assisting me when I needed help. I hope to have a chance to attend one of Professor Brad’s classes again.