This week (13-17 August 12) marks the sweet closure of EIR, with the beginning of an exciting future ahead for all of you. Its hard to bid farewell so soon especially when we have just started to know one another better. Though physically we are not together in class anymore, we trust that the research fireworks which have been ignited earlier will continue to burn in each one of you as you apply the research skills in your life beyond EIR. Hey, you all DID it! You all survived EIR despite your hectic workload. Pat yourselves on the back. Indeed, “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”. Thank you for your warm friendship, enthusiastic and active class participation which makes teaching EIR so meaningful for the subject team. We appreciate your kind patience in faithfully completing the class activities, despite commitments in your personal and academic life. For the groups who had presented last week, thank you for sharing your research findings - you all have done a good job:). To the presenters this week, we trust that you will do an equally epic-win presentation that will rock the house too. We had a joyful experience interacting and teaching all of you and learning from one another. Our friendship will continue virtually on our EIR DPA Facebook page, Twitter, email and/or MSN. As a final closure to our EIRApr 2012 semester, we invite you to spend 1-minute of your time to autograph a meaningful and inspirational comment/remark about EIR in the comments column of this EIR blog. Please also give us your feedback on EIR via OLIVE. As you end your EIR journey and begin your new journey in your respective Diplomas, remember to work hard to achieve your dreams by taking good care of your health too. You can achieve your dreams when you believe in yourself and what you are doing. Till we meet again in other encounters, wish you all the best in your future endeavours. Stay Positive & Happy Always! Ms Faridah, on behalf of the awesome EIR Subject Team 13 August 2012
Having difficulty describing what you think or feel about something? Try using a metaphor. For example, you can use ice-kacang to describe something that is colourful, cheerful and sweet or grapes to describe an experience that is sour (challenging) yet sweet (nice) at the same time. EIR students are taught how to use metaphors since the first lesson in which they had to describe their strengths using metaphors. Its interesting to hear students’ description of themselves using creative metaphors. EIR students also had to use a metaphor to describe their learning journey and reflect on the most important lesson they had learnt throughout the journey. Reading students thoughtful reflections using metaphors has always been a delightful treat for the EIR tutor at the end of each run of EIR as he/she savour the students’ wonderfully crafted explanation of their amazing EIR journeys.
Reflection is a process of self-learning and discovery of the lessons learnt after completing a task. Its like looking at yourself in the mirror and asking what do you see in the mirror. It is a thinking process that helps a person learn from the good and bad effects of what he/she had done. In learning EIR, students are taught to reflect through the process of researching including analysing the effectiveness of search facilities, usefulness of site visits and what they had learnt throughout the entire EIR journey. It is heartening to read about students’ deep reflections about their unique EIR journey via their EIR blogs and tweets. These reflections truly captured the essence of students learning of EIR and provide testimony of the effectiveness of the EIR subject delivery.