Critical Reflections

At the beginning of the module, there were a couple of goals I had in mind which I would want to achieve at the end of it. The goals I had were, improve my personal communication skills, improve my writing skills, and build enough confidence to talk with an audience.

Professor Blackstone has been a catalyst to my progress in achieving my goals as weeks go by. Plenty of beneficial knowledge was passed down to his students. Despite many mistakes made, he continuously provides me with constructive feedback on the areas that I should focus on and improve further. This helps me improve my writing skills. There were many times when I consult Professor Blackstone regarding my summary analysis and tech report, and he would constantly tell me the strengths and weaknesses in the writing. With the feedback he has given me, I understood the areas that I need to work on. As for personal communication skills and building confidence to speak, there were many activities that Professor Blackstone had carried out in class to help me improve in these areas. The activity that I had benefitted the most is when Professor Blackstone asked me to share my thoughts regarding a specific topic with everyone in the class. In the early stages of the module, I find it pretty hard to gather my thought and lay it out to everyone. As time goes on and Professor Blackstone gives plenty of opportunities to take part in such activities enhanced my ability to adapt and improve. It helps me to build my confidence which allows me to gather my thought and share it with my audience.

During the project, I was able to brainstorm along with my team. Even though we decided to change our ideas midway through the project, we were able to meet all of the project requirements. Through the research project, it helps me widened up my prospect on clean energy. It helps me see what sources of clean energy available are reliable and sustainable.

In the process of the research project, I was given the opportunity to work in all the areas of the project which include the meeting minutes, tech report, and oral presentation. I have little to no experience in writing meeting minutes. Hence, I face difficulties on which format would be suitable and the details that should be taken down in the minutes. But over time, through trial and error, I manage to get a suitable format and able to take down key pieces of information that are needed for the minutes. In the tech report, I realised that it was not much different from the assessment we did earlier, summary analysis. Even though the format and number of words were different, had to do research on our idea and pen it down into a tech report.

During the oral presentation, I was able to show my presentation skills and put what I have learnt since the beginning of the module to display. Despite being nervous in the early stages of my presentation, I was able to overcome them. Expressing my thoughts to my audience in a way that they are able to understand and it felt like I had a good time presenting. It felt like that could be one of the best presentations I had thus far.

In conclusion to my reflection, improving and gaining new skills through this module leading me to attain my goals will not stop me here. I believe it is important for me to continue practicing and develop them even further. This skill set is one of the key things that would make us different than the rest. Being able to work well with others also determines how the outcome of the work would be. Thus, I had a great time attaining new knowledge and skills in the Effective Communication Module.