My Reflections ...

Forewarning: This is a really long post.

Being born in a Chinese-oriented family; one who had always been failing English tests; one who memorized her way through General Paper in Junior College; one who failed her Qualifying English Test(QET) and had to go for additional English modules in NUS, picking up ES2007S, ANOTHER english-related module was not an easy choice. Nonetheless, there no single moment in which I have ever regretted taking this module. Through the activities I have done in the class, I have nothing but great memories of the class and will cherish the lessons I have learnt from this class. I believe they are of high importance as these components will carry on even after graduation and into my career in the future.

1. Resume and Application Letter Writing
As a person who had never viewed resumes and application letters to be of much importance, being given the task to peer teach this topic truly opened up my mind on how impactful a good resume can be. I am thankful for the editing efforts contributed by my classmates in spicing up my resume and understand the objective of my resume to market myself well. 

2. Mock Interview and “Elevator” Pitch
These two are the funniest and most terrifying exercises for this module. It is terrifying at the receiving end but enjoyable being the mean interviewers. Though I do feel that we are not given enough trainings to call ourselves experts in handling interviews, I do feel much more confident in going for an interview AND interviewing people. I am acquired with the knowledge on what possible questions I am to expect and trained to think and speak on my feet to impress my interviewers. 

3. Minutes of Meeting, Proposal Writing and Final Oral Presentation (OP)
I was never appointed as a secretary due to my poor writing skills. Being the secretary for my group project certainly threw me out of my comfort zone to look up on the proper way on writing minutes for the team, which I am glad I finally learnt how to. I always assumed Minutes of Meeting to be easy, but there is more to what a GOOD Minutes of Meeting can bring us. For other modules, where proposals are a must, we were never provided with any guidelines on how an impressive proposal should be. We simply get the main idea written down, add some images, line up some references and never to get them back to know our mistakes. In this course, we were actually provided with the proper way to write one and also the chance to amend our mistakes. Last but not least, is our OP. Better late than never, I am glad to understand that there is no such thing as the PERFECT presentation for all. Different presentation serves different needs and objectives that the presenter wants to bring across to the audience or the stakeholders. Now that I understand this important fact, I believe my future presentations would be able to achieve my intended goals.

Throughout the whole course, I believe I did not merely acquire all these straightforward learning outcomes. In addition, I also gained valuable life lessons from my friends and my tutor. Before enrolling into the university, my life had rather been a smooth sailing one. I never once had doubts on any choice that I’ve made and had always been performing to my best in everything I do. Up till the point where I have to decide what to study that dictates my future, I am stuck. I went to architecture and switched to statistics, and to be honest, this is still not what I want. I was in agony every single day of my university life and I was regretting every single choice I made. The competitive spirit in NUS did nothing to ease my agony. University was a cruel place where everyone refuses to help one another just so that you are at the other end of the bell curve where he or she can take advantage of.

However things were different here. In this class, everyone is so helpful and this is the most united class I had ever been to since the start of my university journey. These are the group members who I do not mind having projects through late nights, and these are the classmates I had great lunch times and conversations with. I realized results are not everything in life, but the great experience and strong relationships with people are what that is going to bring one far in future with no regrets. In Professional Communication class, not only are we exposed to how one should communicate professionally, but also how to strike daily conversations and establish true relationships with one another. I am really thankful that Brad tried to make us work with different groups of people for every different assignment so that we will mingle around, rather than forming cliques. 

I am thankful to Han for always challenging my thinking process and consoling me that results are not a good reflection of one’s ability and to always trust myself. I really admire his complex way of looking at things and how he always managed to come up with brilliant questions. Seriously Han, can you stop being so clever? XP

Thank you Ding Ding and Sumea, my 2 exchange group mates who have showed me that even as an exchange student, one can still give his or her best for the sake of others. My friends always warned me not to group with exchange students because their grades do not matter so long they passes. And they are the ones who will be MIA(missing in action) most of the time or present substandard work. However, this was not true for Dingding and Sumea. Both of them were always trying their best to alleviate my work load and worry if they were doing enough so that I can get a good grade. Thank you Sumea and Dingding for showing me the correct way of learning, and I hope to be able to spread such positive attitude on my exchange trip.

To my beloved Huiyun who I always thought I had great affinity with, it is a pity we were never in the same group for any major assignments. However, I am thankful for having you around to have “Singaporean-talks” with me all the time and always giving me that reassuring smiles and nods. 

I will miss the “girls talk” with Minthu, Ronald, Bernard, Han, Rohit and Chandra before class or during lunch at Kou Fu. I really love the chatting sessions and it was fun having you guys that made this class so enjoyable and interesting. 

Thank you, Eric and YongSheng, who I believe are my 2 number 1 blogfans and always providing me with insights through your comments.

Thank you, Sai for always making my day with your dance moves and the never-ending whistling(which annoys Sumea all the time). 

Thank you, Thao for always being so kind and spread that contagious smile of yours throughout the whole course.

Thank you each and every one of you. And thank you Brad for making all these possible.