Reading ES2007S as a module is one of the best choice I've made in my three years in NUS. I particularly found the soft skills learned relevant and important for my future. These include interpersonal relationship, teamwork, presentation skills, time management and appropriate handling of emotions. There were many opportunities throughout the entire course for us to explore each of these.
We begin as a class of 14 students and I remembered how each of us sat in our own seats feeling awkward to speak up. However, we ended the course last week as a lively class, comfortable to speak up and having our arms around each other for kodak moments. These would not be possible without the numerous activities we did in class. I reflect on the process of crafting and finally presenting our proposal and through this, I realized that the perfect project can only be achieved through excellent teamwork. Teamwork is not just about doing our parts as delegated but extending support to our team mates not only in the aspects of the project but also each others personal life. By understanding and putting in effort to know your team mates, the team will be able to achieve outstanding results as we enjoy the process together. This is in contrast to being obliged to doing work delegated to us and working on it 1 hour before the due date. The project has also helped us develop soft skills such like time management. Most of us had our mid term papers as well essays due while we were crafting our proposal, it was important for us to manage our schedule. With that, we also had to learn to cope with stress. I am thankful for my group mates who were extremely supportive throughout the process and have provided me with comic relief and support whenever I was feeling stressed and overwhelmed with work.
ES2007S has reminded me about the importance of teamwork. Everyone was once told that teamwork is important from the day we started school but not everyone had the chance to experience what excellent teamwork will lead us to. When I look back at the entire process of discussing and crafting our proposal while typing out this post, I feel an immense sense of satisfaction. :)
I believe I will not be one of those students who walked through the portal of NUS and enter the workforce with an accredited degree but absolutely no interpersonal skills.
Hey Jacq!
ReplyDeleteToo bad blogger.com does not allow me to like your post, and Facebook only allows me to like it once. Your blog post was a really enjoyable read, mostly because I truly identify with so much of what you wrote - even though we had different learning points in the course!
I did feel a sense of social awkwardness in the first few lessons too, and I was glad that even though it was initially a monologue by Brad, it did not stay that way for long. I also agree that the penultimate OP really helped to bond our group to become much better friends - from people who barely even knew each other! The skills we acquired along the way, we acquired together! Time management skills, organizing skills, team work skills! I do hope you teach me your ppt slide skills though, it was really nearly all done by you. You are so incredibly creative and visual!
Lastly with regards to the professor's opinions on the power of the NUS degree. I sadly agree. A degree is really earned by hard work, not necessarily by skill. And I do think that the academic sphere is too competitive, which diminishes the quality of learning and promotes cramming - but that is of course just a personal opinion. Like you, I am also very thankful to have the pleasure of undertaking a skills course which definitely colored my semester with wonderful memories!
It was a real pleasure knowing you jacq! Hope to see you around in campus!
Hi Titus! :D
DeleteI don't even know how to reply you but it was really awesome knowing you too! I felt that I have to tell you that all the times I've made fun of you during the process of our projects was sincerely just for fun. :D I'm sure you won't curse me over them right? :D
My ppt slide slides are just average! Look at DirectNUS slides! Those are really awesome! :D (But I won't deny the fact that I was once president of my secondary school's media club :P *Smirk*)
Jacq
Hello Jacky,
ReplyDeleteI actually feel upset that this will be the last blog post that I will be commenting on for everyone. The class has ended:((( Bohoo hooo!!!
Jacky you have been a great friend throughout class and you were one of the those who made life in class so fun and enjoyable. I definitely owe you one for that. I really liked the fact that you are very helpful and concerned about everyone in the group. I could really rely on you if I needed help so thanks for that Jacky.
I share your sentiments about the class and I wish that this semester did not have to end so soon. I also agree with you that teamwork is an important element especially in the workforce. All I can say is that the people in your group are going to be very lucky people to have you in their group:)
Keep smiling and stay pretty Jacky! Oh yes and make more appetising breakfasts from today on alright;) HAHA just joking!
Hi Jacq!
ReplyDeleteI think we've all come a long way, and the past 13 weeks have been one of the best times we've had thus far in NUS. From week 1 till now, I feel that your grasp of the language has improved significantly! Throughout these 13 weeks, you were very interactive and responsive during every lesson, even if you might be feeling tired. I am really amazed at how you manage to keep up your enthusiasm. It was very infectious and it did bring a lot of fun to the class (:! Team work may be a boon or a bane, and this greatly depends on how we choose to deal with it. Oftentimes we may not be grouped with the best people, but I feel that we should not stop trying to elicit enthusiasm from them. Well, if it suceeds, it'll only bring more satisfaction to the project journey. Cheers!
Thanks Kristyn!
DeleteCan I confess that somehow along the way I forgot that you were in my blog group? I've no idea why, probably because I'm that absent minded. :/ I've had my own share of being grouped with annoying people too and those are the times that you wish you can get over and done with it quickly and move on with our lives. Yet this time, I wished that the presentation date shouldn't be soon! There should really be a minor in communication skills in NUS. :D
Jacq
Hi Jac!
ReplyDeleteThis was one of the liveliest classes that I've had.. and I guess that I don't see this often as generally science classes are really quiet. Maybe that was one of the reasons that led your professor to lament about the lack of interpersonal skills of his students. I feel that having the knowledge of content without the skills of communicating it renders one's knowledge useless.
I've experienced great team work in this course too, and I've enjoyed working with you in both the proposal and peer teaching=) I think I have a lot to learn from you as you always seem to have good ideas and confidence in speaking out. All the best to you~
Thanks Eileen! :D
DeleteI've enjoyed working with you too! :D Thanks for volunteering to help and I always enjoyed listening to your laughter because it's SOOOO CUTE! Okay, I'm sounding little freaky here but what I meant was it was really nice working with all of you because we always start our discussion laughing and end the discussion laughing which is a good thing. Thanks for your high level of initiative as well. :)
See you around Eileen and HAPPY GRADUATION! :D
Dear Jacq, Thank you for this excellent final post. I like the way you open with the anecdote regarding your chat with a professor about the fact that NUS students needs interpersonal skills in the workplace. You then elaborate on what we did in class to address such needs, especially in the area of team and project work. When you mention the way that 14 individuals start the class, but in the end everyone is posing and acting as friends, a smile comes to my face. Yes! Doesn't learning happen best in that situation? It is very satisfying to me to see a student like you walk away from ES2007S satisfied, and I have to congratulate you on your achievements, in the blogging, in the project work, and most importantly, in the interpersonal sphere.
ReplyDeleteIn that last area, you need a special commendation, Jacq, since you did an amazing job in class being a model of the sort of student who embraces learning and development, to the point where you welcomed the critiquing of your posts openly. That's really great---and I will always appreciate your wide smile as we went about our work.
All the best to you as you continue your learning!
Hi Brad,
DeleteThank you! This gratitude extends beyond your comment for this post. Thank you for such an excellent and useful course and I'm very sure it wouldn't be the same if I were to be in another group. Your teaching method has been extremely useful and since my future profession will be an educator, I wish I will be as effective as you.
This post had been extremely difficult to post as compared to the earlier ones because there's just so many things that this course have taught me and that includes being concise because I have an extremely bad habit of being long-winded and naggy. I'm also poor in my grammar which is something I had been aware of and it is also because of my weakness in grammar that have led me to give up reading literature as a module at varsity level although literature is one of the subject I'm most passionate about. There was one lesson when we were going through my blog post that you mentioned, "You might just be writing what comes into your mind." Then I realized how right you were! I had been writing what comes to my mind all my life and going through what I've written to edit. However, being extremely careless, I tend to skip words. With that in mind, I've tried to plan and craft my sentences as grammatically correct as possible. I just did a quick read through my post and I spotted a few errors again. :( But I'll work on it.
Thanks Brad! :D
Hi Jac,
DeleteIt is perfectly okay to be writing what comes to your mind, if and only if, your mind is already grammatically correct! Does that make sense?
Once when I was in ES2007s Brad told us the opposite, in fact, saying that expert prose writers wrote simply whatever comes to mind, effortlessly, like speaking. At the highest levels of language development I suppose, you speak and write almost the same exact way. That means if you write grammatically right, you speak grammatically right as well, if you used certain words in writing, you would also used it in speaking to a large extent, if you structure your sentences the way you do during writing, you unconsciously structure it that way while speaking as well. I try to speak the way I write, but being human and afraid of being called aloof by my classmates never dared, so there is always this struggle in me, of knowing what excellent speaking and writing is from hearing British and American audios but being afraid of putting them in practice effortlessly and without regard for what my contemporaries would think.
Thankfully Jac, you made fantastic friends as a result of the learning process, nothing else compared, as you mentioned. Best of luck!
Cheers
Dear Jac, Allow me to respond to Mark:
DeleteMy dear boy....I said what? "...expert prose writers wrote simply whatever comes to mind, effortlessly, like speaking"? I don't recall that, and if I did, I must have been referring to William Burroughs and his mad stream-of-consciousness novel, Naked Lunch. But I would never say such a thing in reference to professional communication. In most settings, even a person with my age and experience in writing needs to craft prose rather than just write what comes to mind. If I'm writing a letter to my sister, or a response to you here, okay, well, stream of consciousness is fine. But not generally!
Yes Brad, I also forgot the context of that statement, but this particular statement flickered in my mind when it was mentioned 'write what comes to mind'. I suspect you were talking in relative terms. You meant expert prose writers didn't write like they spoke impromptu or without crafting, but that they did it a couple levels more effortlessly that it would come across to normal writers like me as writing like speaking, and effortlessly. You didn't mention William Burroughs or Naked Lunch, there I can only make some estimations.
DeleteOr perhaps I think you meant writing what came to mind not as anything dictated by our own selfish natures but rather in the sense of the tools of the language to express what is already well-crafted or well thought-out prose, or an unselfish executive email to a boss, before the actual writing begins. Yeah, I think that is it, you meant it that language way.
Hello Jacq!
ReplyDeleteThis is a very insightful takeaway for the entire course. It's saddening to see how even the best students can leave a university without these vital interpersonal skills. I'm surprised that courses like ES2007S or at least a shrunken down version has not been made mandatory for all NUS students. I'm glad that I bothered to open that email promoting ES2007S and ended up in this course. I have learnt so much and I truly feel that I have not only learnt what it is to be professional, but through ES2007S, beyond just gaining soft skills, I have become more self-aware and more in control of how I interact with others.
I have enjoyed having you as a classmate and I appreciate your comments raised in class. Thank you for your contributions to the class, Jacq!
Hi Jacq!
ReplyDeleteLike you, I've learnt so much in this course. And all that I learnt is so useful that I don't mind taking this module again, or doing an extension of this module. I think that modules like such should be made a compulsory for all NUS students. It really helped us to gain so much, from communication to presenting to writing.
Thank you for being such a wonderful classmate as well as blog group team mate! All the best! (: