Critical Reflection

 Module Learning

Writing the literature review and technical report has taught me about proper past present participle. When writing the literature review, I wrote it in the past tense as I thought that whatever was being evaluated by me has already happened. Then I learned that since I am evaluating a current device which was still in operation, the information which is still true to the device would be in present tense. For example, I wrote “The Trace Gas Orbiter was successful in its mission as it had taken useful data of Mars atmospheric gases”. However, as the Trace Gas Orbiter is still orbiting around Mars and collecting data, I should have written it as “The Trace Gas Orbiter was successful in its mission as it takes useful data of Mars atmospheric gases.” In the future I would have to be more aware of the past or present participle used based on the context of my writing and use the proper past or present participle.

I have learnt more about how to be an effective presenter. When we were made to consolidate key points of an article and present it to the group, I had to learn to prepare and present a mini presentation. These exercises would teach me more about effective ways to present from the lessons taught and from seeing other classmates present. This also requires us to learn how to be engaging by being precise and bringing our ideas across effectively where we had to use critical thinking to evaluate the main points of an article. In the future, I would have to apply the skills learnt on in the future when giving a presentation.

 

Project Learning

Doing the technical report, I realized that it was helpful if every member of the group researched on all the topics instead of dividing the work and having each member research on different parts. For example, if there was three topics which needed to be researched on, instead of splitting the work and having each member research on one of the topics, every member researches on all the topics. This way, I felt that there was much more information gotten as more sources was read and studied, giving the group a better understanding on a particular topic and able to have more depth and details in the report. From this experience of looking up on sources to write the technical report, I have learnt how to effectively find the sources relevant and required for the report, which is an important skill needed to do a report.

When preparing for the group oral presentation, I felt that it was important for the group to do the presentation slides together instead of each member doing their own slides. This is because when each member does their own slides, the formatting and style of the slides would not be consistent which should not be the case in a group presentation. While doing the slides, it was also good that the group was able to discuss what was going to be mentioned in each slide so that everyone in the group is able to plan on what should not be repeated in their part of the presentation.