Critical Reflection

At the start of this module, I set some goals to achieve at the end of this module which were to be able to express my point of view and ideas more clearly with greater assurance and also to be able to confidently make a presentation in front of a big crowd. At the start of the trimester, I always dread going to class because I knew that there would be a lot of presentations for this module. Speaking and sharing in front of a big crowd is one of my biggest fear since polytechnic as I always get nervous and worry that I will mess up my speech. During the lesson time of this module, I was given numerous opportunities to express my point of view in class and presentations which I am very grateful for. This allowed me to improve my oral presentation skills in front of a big crowd. With the feedback given by my peers and the professor after the presentation, I was able to recognize where my mistakes were and areas for improvement. This allows me to think and reflect on what I can do to improve my presentation for next time. Although there were still some hesitancy and stuttering during the oral presentation, I felt that I have done my best. I believe that with more practice I would be able to give a better and more fluent presentation next time. During this module, we were also always assigned to different groups of people. This allows me to understand different people have different working styles and teaches me how to adapt faster to get things done more efficiently. 

In conclusion, after the 13 weeks of lessons, I feel that my goals were somewhat achieved. I was able to express my ideas more clearly and make a presentation in front of a big crowd. I believe that I have come out of my shell slightly and I would have the potential to come out fully in the near future.

For the research project, I was grouped to work with people that I never interact with before to come up with a new innovation or an improvement for a current implementation. This helps me understand the importance of communication and how to communicate with my teammates effectively. Also, It allows me to know how to resolve an issue if there is a difference in viewpoints through effective communication. I managed to identify the strength and weaknesses of each of my teammates and this would allow for a better allocation of roles when writing the report or during presentation. With the help of this module, I learned how to write a technical report properly and the necessary structures and components need. I also learned the proper way of doing a citation according to APA 7 standards. There are different types of frameworks used for critical thinking and reflection such as Paul-Elder’s framework. For presentation skills, I learned to use the 7C’s for effective communication and that using “I will pass my time over now…” is not formal during a presentation and we can introduce the following speaker by stating their name and giving a brief overview of what they would be talking about.

All in all, I am still thankful for this module as it allows me to interact with more of my peers, deepen my understanding of how to do presentations properly and how to use different techniques to write reports.