Final Reflection

Looking back on the past 13 weeks, it was really amazing how much we were to accomplish within the relatively short time span. I think we have all enjoyed ourselves in the process of picking up useful and effective communication skills, as well as life skills.

To be concise, I will talk about the most important thing that I learnt from this module, that is, to speak effectively in front of an audience.

Prior to this module, I did not have many opportunities to do presentations. Initially, I was slightly daunted by the amount of public speaking that we had to do but I then realized that these experiences were opportunities for me to brush up on my presentation skills. Throughout the course, I put in a substantial amount of effort to make sure my presentation skills were up to mark, be it in the peer teaching, the oral discussion or the oral presentation. Today, I think my presentation skills have improved significantly as compared to three months ago. But this achievement would not have been possible without the comments by Brad, my group members and the rest of the class. To Brad, I really appreciate the detailed comments that you have written in our assessment. To my group members and my classmates, I sincerely thank each and every one of you, for all the comments and encouraging words that you have written in my blog and voiced out during the class. All of these have been instrumental in my pursuit of a better presenter.

Next, with regards to blogging, I think it is imperative for students to constantly practise and hone their writing skills. Unlike speaking, blogging requires one to be more careful with the use of grammar and the choice of words. In addition, I thought it was actually a good platform for me to get to know my classmates better in the first few weeks, especially when we were still a little reserved in class.

Finally, I think we all chose to take this module at the start of the semester because we wanted to improve our communication skills, but I think none of us (at least for me) would have expected to come away with so many friends and so many pleasant memories, on top of learning the syllabus of the course. Once again, I thank Brad and all of you from Group 10 for making my learning experience so enjoyable!

Oral Presentation Video

Oral Presentation

For this oral presentation, I have spent a great deal of time preparing and rehearsing my speech. What I did was to internalize the outline of my speech, read the proposal a couple of times, and then it was practice, practice and more practice. I think the more I rehearsed, the more confident I felt, and it made me less nervous today.

Just to refresh everyone's memory, I talked about the 3 unhappy faces versus 1 happy face, the 7:1 ratio and the 3 cases in NTU, Hong Kong and UK.

For my delivery, I think one of my strengths this time round was that I made a point to pause at the right places and emphasize words appropriately. That was something that I did not do in the past. I tried my best to speak as fluently as I could, and to pronounce the words clearly and accurately. However, there were still occasions when my words rolled over themselves, especially when it came to big jargons. So, I still need to improve on that.

With regards to my pace, some people have said I spoke too fast, while others have commented that the speed was okay. So, I need your input, as to how whether my pace was alright or I should have slowed down.

As for nonverbal cues, I realized (after watching the video) that I had lots of gestures this time round. I hope it was not too distracting. Other than that, I think I did well in turning to visual aids effectively, having effective eye contact and a good posture.

Finally, if you have any suggestions for me to improve my presentation skills, please feel free to comment. Thanks in advance!