Critical Reflection

 At the beginning of the trimester, I felt the need to improve my thought organization and enhance my writing habits. Within these 13 weeks, I can proudly say that i managed to achieve my goals and gained valuable insights in proper writing techniques and presentation skills. 

Through the lessons and guidance provided, I was able to address issues in my sentence structure, acquire citation skills, and learnt how to select articles to support my report writing. There were instances where I felt lost while writing my reader’s response, but I managed to fall back on the lesson on paraphrasing and using ChatGPT prompts to generate interesting pointers that served as a backbone structure for my writeup. Through the pointers generated, I managed to dig up more information and expanded my knowledge of the topic. This allowed me to freely elaborate and be flexible with my words, which reflected how well I did. Through this course, I believe that critical thinking has helped me step out of my comfort zone and improve how I interact with others. It has taught me the importance of effective communication, and I feel able to communicate better with others. 

Through the group project, I managed to learn more about my team members and classmates, about their passions and writing habits. While everyone has different writing styles and opinions, I learned that there are multiple correct ways to approach writing a report. Understanding the topic thoroughly was also crucial. As I was presented with a new idea that delved into the bio-engineering field, i was very lost and was heavily dependent on my teammate at the start. However, I felt angry at myself for being so helpless but couldn't come up with ideas or solutions, so I used OneSearch to explore more articles and watched several TED talks to gain more insight on the topic. As I familiarized myself with my peers' work and the bio-engineering field of prosthetics, I gained insights that drove me to take control of the topic and make valuable suggestions for improvements. This enabled me to communicate confidently and take charge during the presentation, instead of being controlled by fear and helplessness. In the future I will always strive to be an active learner and always take control of the subject and be an expert in the field of engineering.

Additionally, I found the presentation tips from Garrey Reynolds exceptionally good as it helped craft engaging presentation slides for the group, and I felt that the tips such as focusing on 1 picture a slide to empower the presenter was particularly helpful and powerful during my presentation. By implementing these newly acquired skills, I significantly improved my writing and presentation abilities. I am confident that these skills will be beneficial in the future as i enter the workforce and present my ideas to my colleagues and clients. 

In the past, I would have simply gone with the flow and tackled whatever tasks were assigned to me. However, this module taught me how to think critically and actively decide what I want and how to achieve it.