Critical Reflection on Project Learning

The topic that my team and I had chosen for our project is Effective Listening while resolving conflicts within the family. The focus for this post would be on my oral presentation skills.

I was the first to present in my team and to elaborate on the introduction on our topic. When I present, I would usually display a picture or two to the audience. This will in tend grasp their attention and make them ponder and guess on what the topic I would be presenting. This is one of the skills that I picked up on the module Composition during last trimester. Saying said so, the only time that I recalled presenting to the class was only last trimester during the module and once during the mock presentation this trimester. 

In the module interpersonal and workplace communication, one of the key things that I have learnt is verbal and non-verbal communication. I believe this is an important topic to be covered during the module. It helps us to improve on active listening, interpreting verbal messages and read their non-verbal. This is somewhat similar to the group project that my team has presented. Relating back to the presentation that I have given last Friday, I feel that I may have actually done some wrongs during the mock presentation.

During the mock presentation, the feedback that I received were that I may have actually dragged my presentation by repeating the same points so as to make it seem longer. At the same time, I was constantly seen checking my watch which was seem to be a distraction to the audience. These are where the verbal and non-verbal communication comes into play. For verbal communication, I was constantly repeating the same points to the audience which was a distraction. To me, I thought I was reemphasizing my points, but to the audience, it was seen as a distraction as I was constantly repeating them. For my non-verbal communications, I was constantly checking my watch which was also a distraction to the audience. I have to agree on this one as they may think that I am time-oriented, who cares about the time. These are the takeaways for to improve myself and be prepared for the final presentation.

On the final presentation, I could say that I’ve improved a bit. I made sure I was not reemphasizing on the same points over and over again. And also importantly, improve on my non-verbal communications by maintaining eye contacts to the audience instead of my watch instead. The only flaw this time was that I may have dragged the time too long for the audience instead by exceeding the time limit of 5 minutes and at the fact that I was pretty nervous. Some may have not noticed it but I’m sure Brad has noticed my nervousness. I believe I should improve myself in this aspect in order to improve myself for any future presentations.

During this module, I’ve learnt that I could improve myself once I get feedback from people. Constant feedback from people enhances my learning and also the ability to improve myself. Moreover, by applying what I have learnt during this module such as verbal and non-verbal communication can come in handy for any presentations or communication as not everyone is the same thus, different people may react differently when communicating. Lastly, I may lack confidence during presentations. Having mentioned all those points, I believe feedback, verbal and non-verbal communications and confidence are the few key takeaways that could be useful in the future.

In the future, I should take all of the key takeaways that I have mention to improve myself in terms of presentation wise. Those feedback that I’ve received will be forever remembered for me and to evaluate myself so that I would not repeat any of the flaws. Putting aside feedback, I should learn to better judge myself when presenting and to look at people’s verbal and non-verbal communications. By judging this, I would be able to know when to stop so as to not bore the audience. Finally, I should practice more on my verbal presentations so that I could be more confident for future presentations.

I appreciate the time and effort you read this post of mine. With that, I shall end my post.

Re-edited 17/4/2016