05/04/2021 Critical Reflection

Personal Reflections on MEC1281 - Effective Communications.

Module Learning

Looking back on the past 13 weeks, I have completed this module with a piece of greater knowledge of writing and communicating. At the start of this module, I quite was nervous, entering the class of effective communications knowing that my writing and grammar were not that good. However, after attending a few classes conducted by Professor Brad, he shared valuable life lessons and always emphasized the learning outcomes of every opportunity. Setting my goals at the start of the module and looking back at how much I have accomplished, I have achieved beyond what I have expected but still seeking improvements like Professor Brad always says,  " what is the learning outcome for today?" is a sentence that encourages us, students, to seek learning opportunities in every way. 

Moving forward with the skills set learned in this module, as a future engineer myself, it is important to write an efficient report and present my ideas clearly for the investor or stakeholders to understand. Therefore, with the practice and constructive feedbacks has given by my classmates and professor, through this module effective communications, I am able to improve in writing as well as presenting confidently in front of a group of people, cautiously reminding myself that I should not make the same mistakes I have made previously. 

As quoted by Mahatma Gandhi, " Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever." For every small step that I have taken, I should always keep looking forward to taking another step. After this module, this will not be the end of effective communication, instead, it is just the beginning of applying the skills set I have picked up in this module. Knowing my weakness of having too many grammatical errors, I should read good articles, such as newspapers, and learn how they write an effective and engaging article for the readers. In this way, I can improve my writing skills, grammar and additionally, expanding my vocabulary. 

With this module heavily needed to read articles, unknowingly, I have built a habit of reading articles and books so that I able to speak and write in proper English, correcting phases or filler words that I had been using all this time. In the long run of having this habit, I believe I can improve further, using proper grammar in my writing skills and communication skills.

Project Learning

Through this project, I have met great teammates who are very cooperative and I could not ask for more. Other than the research we have done in this project about Alzheimer's, I have realized a few key points for a successful projection completion, which are communication between group mates, teamwork, and reliability.

At the start of this project, I was rather nervous about who am I going to work with for this project. However, they turn out to be some of the best people I have worked with so far. We always communicate and do things together, keeping each other updated and asking for opinions so that everybody is on the same page. having good communication and teamwork between us, we have unknowingly built a sense of reliability in each other.

Having done this project together, we will correct each other in writing the report and well as giving constructive feedback on each other presentation during our practice for our final presentation. I personally am a weaker writer among the three of my groupmates, they will always try to correct me in my tenses, sentence structure, and grammar. As quoted by Robert Heinlein, "When one teaches, two learn." this quote is said, I can relate to myself as we try to help each other, we are the ones who are learning together and improving together.

Upon the completion of this project, I have learned to communicate effectively and through effective communication, we are able to work well together without any dispute. However, in my opinion, we have struggled at the beginning with selecting the final idea that we all have come up with. we could have communicated better at the beginning and could been more decisive in the selection process. Therefore, in conclusion, communication is a key point that leads to many factors to successful project completion.

Looking forward to the end of the module, I have learned many valuable lessons taught by Professor Brad and will always be hungry for improvements. Thank you to Professor Brad and everybody that has helped me in this journey and hope we will crossed path again! 

Adios :)