The Final Post

In this final reflection, I could honestly just leave it at a simple ‘I learnt A LOT’ – and be done with it.

Then again, that would not do the past 14 weeks justice.

One of the main things I’ve learnt is that I simply have so much to learn! I came into this module knowing that I was capable of speaking in front, and holding the attention, of people. However, as I participated in the process of nurturing others and being nurtured by others, I quickly realised that I had areas that needed improvement – especially in my ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’, multitasking with cue-cards in one hand and a pointer in the other, distributing eye contact and so on.

More than that, as I saw my peers – most notably through ones like Liyana, Ding Long and Vanessa – I saw how they developed their style of speaking to the point that they could speak steadily, crisply, with confidence and without resorting to much ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’.

That was amazing! I found myself to be a fast-paced speaker who mainly utilized that fast pace to keep the attention of the audience. However, seeing my peers present in such a manner really gave me a desire to also explore this steady-yet-authoritative style of speaking for myself.

Also, I especially enjoyed how the content covered also served to complement the things learnt under the Social Work department. This includes content such as the significance of the nonverbal, the causes for communication breakdown, the 7 Cs in communication and so on. Especially helpful was the content covered on doing up one’s application letter and proposal – these were areas that even the practice-oriented curriculum in Social Work could not cover.

Lastly (sort of), I especially learnt how a comfortable class culture could really allow for not just the tutor, but also for my peers to reflect back to, and further mould, me.

More has still been yet to be said, but in essence: ‘I learnt A LOT.’

Take care everyone – and don’t be strangers!

Reflection on Teamwork

It's been - and still is - quite the journey thus far in putting this proposal together. Striving to find contacts, collect information, think up solutions and communicate our ideas in the best way possible - all within a quickly diminishing time-limit - has been a very interesting team experience.

Many challenges were surely met, but most of them (in my point of view) have been overcome.

The first one was our scheduling. Finding a common time-slot is merely a routine administrative task, but as all three of us hailed from various faculties and had quite a few commitments outside of NUS, it proved to be a daunting challenge. Technology really helped - email and especially Google drive - but eventually, sacrifices had to be made, and we found ourselves holding our meetings on Sunday afternoons. 

The second challenge was really to maintain a 'innocent-until-proven-guilty' view of each other, especially when deadlines were drawing near. Each of us went through a spell of illness, during which we were unable to contribute - and rightfully so! However, the team still did have to overcome some measure of blaming (even though it was never verbalised) with respect to late or unfinished work. Overall, I felt that keeping channels of communication constantly open was vital in order to enable the postponing of judgement, through clarification over certain actions (or lack of).

The last challenge, I felt, was the general nature of the team to be overwhelmingly task-oriented. Thus far, we have been churning our parts out and sticking to our 'to-do' lists - but I had hoped that there could have been a greater show of appreciation for one another, even though we were all working hard. However, I do believe that an experience of such a 'celebrative' culture within the team would require me to take initiative, and get the ball rolling.

I do look forward to the end of my group's presentation and an end to our labours. At the same time, I do appreciate the lessons that I have received on sacrifice, postponing judgement, and initiative. Here's to my team - cheers!