Critical Reflection

CVE 1281 Effective Communication module was a incredible learning experience. In this module, I have learned many techniques on articulating my ideas in terms of speaking and writing. The goals I had at the start of the module were to improve on my presentation skills and writing skills as I knew that these were some of the skills I needed in near future in workforce.

Presentation skill was the most crucial skill I felt I needed to improve on, previously in my introduction letter, I mentioned that I aspire to take over my family business. As a business owner of a small medium enterprise (SME), presentations are no doubt essential as my family business is project based, giving a proposal presentation like the ones during our class to secure a project is part of the job. In this module there were many instances that everyone gets, to do small presentations and get feedback from peers, I found it a valuable experience to practice presentation skills like eye contact, vocalisation, body language and articulation.After the presentations we receive feedbacks on how we can improve to ensure we learn from our mistakes and get better. I really liked these feedbacks as I was able to learn more about my presentation skills from it and I believe in continuous improvement.During classes I also learned techniques like The Assertion-Evidence Approach and Monroe Motivated Sequence that enhance my presentation. My favourite technique would be the Assertion-Evidence Approach, I learned 3 principles, first principle is to build on messages in a presentation, Second principle is to support your messages with pictures and last principle is to own my content, which resonated with me the most as its one of the things I have always been doing but never noticed. These techniques offers me more assistance in developing a more structured and organised presentations as I realised that my train of thought is all over the place causing me to go off topic or stutter. Now, I’m able to articulate my ideas clearly in a presentation without stuttering or veering off topic.

The other goal I wanted to focus on is my writing ability as english is one of my weakest subject in secondary school I didn’t feel confident in writing. I have learned many techniques for writing like the summary, paraphrasing and 7Cs of communication- Concise, Complete, Concrete, Coherent, Courteous, Correct and Clarity. The one I find myself needing to use the most in paraphrasing as I need to cite a lot of information from research papers. One of my favourite part in every lesson, is that we were given a lot of opportunities to  write and receive feedback on it. This allowed me to learn and refine my writing on what is expected for different types of documents. The feedbacks from the professor and peers allowed me to learn my flaws in writing and avoid it, while giving me tips on what I need to focus and improve on and the most valuable feedbacks came from professor Blackstone as he gave very detailed feedback on the do and don’ts in my writing. Now, I am able to adequately cite and produce an essay with lesser language issues. Nevertheless, my writing still has room for improvement.

The proposal project was one of the biggest grading factor in the module and also one of the most memorable part of the module. My teammates were Ming Hao and Bariah, at the start, we had to choose the roles and I immediately choose the role as a speaker as it aligned with my goal in the module the most, upon getting this role I had many opportunities to speak which helped me gain experience and confidence. Our design topic to tackle was miscommunication at the worksite as we felt that this topic fits the goal of this module, effective communication, likewise we want to engage in a more effective communication on construction site. This project consist of two components, first component the technical report and the other the presentation.

The technical report allowed me to apply the skills I had learn during previous lessons like paraphrasing, citing, summary and the 7Cs of communication. In the report a lot of research had to be done to ensure the information presented is correct, through these research I practice citing of sources and paraphrasing. The executive summary also allowed us to apply the skill of summarising the entire proposal. The technical report 

For the presentation I was very nervous as it was some thing I felt the need to do exceptionally well. I have always pride myself in being able to think on my feet so normally I do not prepare anything when I have to present. during my first small presentation, I was not able to articulate my points and ideas clearly as my thoughts were all over the place. Then i came to a realisation if I do not plan a structure i cannot get my points to others clearly. During the presentation I utilise techniques like the Assertion-Evidence Approach following the principles and structure of presentation to present my group’s idea.

I am a firm believer that communication is the most important skill in the society as it allows you to exchange ideas, knowledge and believes with each other’s. The ability to communicate effectively will dictate your route in life. The things I have learned in CVE 1281 module will be relevant to me no matter how many years pass. Other thing I have learned in the class is to continuously improve yourself, the feedback structure allowed me to learn more about my strengths and weakness so I can learn and improve. With the skills I acquired from this module, I will be able to communicate with my future clients efficiently and present my ideas written or spoken with the 7C’s.