Critical Reflection

 Critical Reflection

Module Reflection

 

The learning experiences I had in UCS1001 were gratifying and enriching. Over the past 13 weeks, I have become more capable of critical thinking and have enhanced my capacity to communicate effectively in both academic and professional setting.

 

In the beginning of the module, my objective for this module was to become a persuasive communicator, and through my writing, master the art of persuasion and influencing people. The Paul-Elder framework was a crucial factor in strengthening my critical thinking and communication abilities. Though it was initially a challenging concept to grasp, I used the frameworks as a guide in my writing and thinking, which really helped me to see a bigger picture than I had previously considered. I have learned from the Paul-Elder thinking model that critical thinking does not have to be a difficult endeavor; by analyzing the message’s underlying premises to determine the motivation behind the thinking, I can then apply the intellectual standard of the framework to evaluate and assess the quality of the thinking. I can then compare the results with intellectual traits to determine the degree of insight and integrity with which a person thinks.

 

With this formula, I am able to structure my messages when communicating according to the highest impact and communicate persuasively and effectively. I learnt that being a persuasive communicator means to be able to articulate and visualize problems and solutions from different perspectives, bringing the ideas across clearly and accurately. I was also able to greatly reduce the usage of Singlish in my presentation as compared to the start of the module.

 

 

Project Reflection

 

In a teamwork setting like the project proposal writing assignment, critical thinking helps us develop the quality if communication in the team and help explain my own ideas clearly without causing a misunderstanding. It was the first module that allowed us to work with each other and we had to sort out our thought processes and decide on what is the topic to discuss and plan out what kind of information we must research on. This greatly assisted me to look for credible sources by cross referencing with other information I found during my research. Even after we found the information we need for the report writing, most of the sources contained a large amount of information. I had to thoroughly read through the information and discuss with my group members whether the information was important and include them in the report.

 

As I have struggle between school and dragon boat I realized that it was almost impossible for us to match our schedule outside of curriculum hours. However, my group members were understanding, and we just dedicate the workload evenly amongst ourselves so that we can also cope with the other modules we have. For instance during the project pitch, we were all struggling with out mid term tests and submissions, so it was only fair that we split the workload evenly amongst ourself.

 

When doing the report, I was going through my groupmate’s part of the report and went to further researched on the topic. I realized that some of the information used was not useful and irrelevant and had to bridge his part with ours. As I group leader, I had to ensure that the direction of the report was driven by me so that I can control the flow of the report. This was a challenge as we all had to juggle with other modules. To solve this problem, we decided to look for more information and I will proof read the information before proceeding into the research and writing. From this incident, I learnt that it is very important to always stick to the Paul-Elder framework to help us complete the task faster.