Short Reflective Journal Entries Assessment 3 Answer

Answer :

JOURNAL ENTRIES

Journal 1

1. Learning Style

Learning style can be described in a way by which each and every person understands, anticipates, organizes and interprets the information which we receive verbally or visually. Therefore, as per Truong, H. M. (2016) the learning style for any specific person depends on his interests, hobbies, abilities and his perceptions. As per VARK model, there are four in which person learns or in other words there are 4 types of learners.

These are as follows:

Visual Learning Styles:

In these learning styles, the person absorbs the information visually that is by seeing picture, watching videos and looking at various diagrams, charts, symbols and various ongoing life events. In other words, these types of learners learning style is by seeing things.

Auditory Learning Styles:

In these learning styles the persons learn through their audio sense that is by listening to the things. The person with these kind of style learns through listening to recordings, speeches, lectures, verbal communications and interactions between people.

Read and write Learning Styles:

In these learning style person learn through extensive reading. That is whenever he reads he learns the things. The written articles, notes and text books helps in learning. Most of these people rewrite and makes the notes and in process learn.

Kinesthetic Learning Styles:

People of this category, learns through experiences. They are experimental in nature and when they get any information or want to learn something, its by first hand experiencing. According to Balakrishnan & Gan (2016) they retain and store the ideas and information whichever they experience and see practically.

According to my observation, I have been experimental in nature from starting and tend to learn things through practical demonstration. I had no idea that I am a kinesthetic learner but when I joined the university and enrolled myself for this course, I come to know about my this learning style and from then on I am using it as one of my strength. Whenever I am not able to retain something important, I tend to apply it on practical things and that way I learn it fast. I tend to watch demonstration videos, tutorials for learning things easily. Earlier I used to do my assignment by reading lots of books but since I have find about my learning style I am taking advices from tutors of academic nature, participating in group discussions and interacting with more and more of peers. All these experiences are helping me a lot in learning new things and retaining them. I also feel that a person should not limit himself to one technique so I am also working on my other learning styles like some times it really helps to rewrite some articles and notes in own words to learn from them.

Journal 2

2. Academic Writing: (Report and essay writing)

Academic writing is a formal kind of writing which is non fictional in nature and have a very formal structure. The language used for the purpose is forma, clear and concise. The and figures presented in academic writing should be supported by evidences, references and examples. This kind of writing is very formal in nature often used in literatures, essays, journal articles, research papers and reviews. Due to its formal nature the structure of writing is often the same with focus on main body of topic. As per Bailey, 2017, The characteristics of this kind of report includes logical and formal structure, evidences which have been based on arguments and facts, impersonal tone and in end valid references (Hyland & Jiang  (2017).

Being an student who is not from Australia but from Nepal, where the academic writing is not much in use. It was very difficult task for me to grasp its basics. Being a country where there are no laws against any kind of immoral acts used in writing like plagiarism, I was not aware with the term. Its only when I joined the course and had to undergone the process of writing assignments that I learnt these important terms like paraphrasing, referencing of different kinds and plagiarism. Being a student with no knowledge of this writing I was immensely helped by the lectures designed specifically for academic research and skill development. It helped me in understanding the format, structure and procedure I need to follow while writing a successful and impactful academic writing. The flow of topic, language and the tone are also the important part of academic writing, report and essay writings and I understand these facts by completing the essay assignments MIHM201 and MIHM208 and report assignments MIHM101 and MIHM102. The way I completed these assignments and the results I got gave me the confidence that I have started to understanding the concept and implemented them successfully in my writing. 

Journal 3

3. Reflective Thinking

Reflective thinking is tool to reflect upon person’s past experiences, emotions, feelings, actions, knowledge and judgement related to any situation or task. It’s a very useful technique used by the leaders all over the world. It helps a person to find about his weakness and strengths (Choy, Lee & Sedhu (2019)). A person can reflect upon what he did wrong or right in given situation and how can he improvise it next time. According to Ghanizadeh, A. (2017) reflective thinking combines the practical and theories and thus, helps a person to learn from the gap between these two. Reflective thinking helps any person to learn more about himself because he can evaluate and analyse the past situation, how he reacted, what were his feeling, what he did wrong and how he can make it right next time. It provides an individual with learning abilities.

When I joined this course this concept was alien to me and I took the lectures for understanding the same. I have never done any reflective assessment before and was not comfortable with the use of same. But while working on the assignment MIHM201, which was about the use of reflective thinking, I understood the concept and how it could help me in my professional as well in my personal life too. While reflecting on my past experience I can learn from my mistakes as well as from achievements too. It has really helped me in expressing my past  and present perspectives and biasness.

Journal 4

4. Note Taking

Note taking is a simple process of recording important information for future use.  Its of main importance during lectures as taking notes helps in keeping record of the important points, examples and information conveyed during a lecture (Peverly & Wolf (2019). People takes notes almost all the time like while reading, writing, listening. Due to its usefulness it can be used as an important strategy in university. As per Chen, (2019)  taking notes reduces the chances of plagiarism because you can present them as reference in valid evidences.

In my initial days of university, I was not in habit of taking and recording the notes during lectures, group discussions and tutorials which resulted in me missing out on many important facts. Since I was not taking the notes it was impossible for me to recollect the facts presented in the lecture and key information shared. I was unable to revise the topics and therefore was missing out on my assignments. As I realized that this impacting my assignments because I missed some important facts being discussed in lectures, I decided to follow the strategy of taking notes. I started to take notes during lectures about the topic, its content, facts presented by the professors, discussion held by students regarding topic and examples, sources and references presented. In fact, I found out that note taking also includes good listening and writing skills as well. Effective listening helps in identifying and distinguishing between important and unimportant information. It also requires the rapid writing skills because one has to note down things fast if they want keep with the pace of lecture. But one thing is still not clear to me that auditory learners who learn through listening also use this strategy or not. 

Journal 5

5. Analysing Sources (CRAAP Analysis) 

CRAAP analysis includes Currency, Relevance, Authority, Accuracy and Purpose. Crap is used as a tool to evaluate the sources (Bailey, 2017). The meaning of various terms are as follows:

Currency: 

Currency describes the time function of the source that is it tells us about the time and date of the source and its validation. It indicates the the time and date of the publication of information. It also ascertains that whether the information has been updated or revised and if yes than what was the date of revision. With the help of currency feature one can find out that the information is applicable in your context or not that means its not out dated and suitable for your time frame. The links given with the date of publication should be functional and and active. All the points if corrects and ok make the source reliable.

Relevance 

Relevance attributes the suitability of information with the given topic. Relevance states that the information provided by the source is related to the question needs to be answered or topic which has been given. It also clarifies that which would be the audience for the topic or answer. According to this criteria the information should be just right that not very basic in nature and not very advanced either. Person’s comfort ability while using it should be considered and the number of sources researched before finalising it should also be considered.

Authority:

This checks the credibility of the source. Reliable source should have full name of author and publisher, Author’s credentials, his qualification to write about information, contact details of author and URL attached to it. The presence of all these information gives credibility to the source and thus provide the authority.

Accuracy:

It ascertains the truthfulness of the source. Whether its reliable or not and correct or not. Accuracy means to find out the origin of the information, its evidential supports, whether its been revised with time or not (Liardét & Black (2016)). The tone presented should be neutral and free from any type of grammatical, spelling or typographical mistakes. If information follows all this points than it can be treated as source.

Purpose:

It verifies the reason of existence of information that is why the information was created. What was the purpose for it.

CRAAP analysis was the new thing for me but the lectures designed by the lecturers of the university helped me in understanding the concept and its usefulness. I have come to know that it’s a very important academic skill because I need to put out the source information many times in my assignments and CRAAP analysis helps me to prove the reliability of my source. It gives me a confidence that the source I have used are trustworthy. Also, In this IT world, there is so much information available with so many sources so its important to identify the real one with the fake one and CRAAP analysis helps me to find out which one to use from the sea of information. For Example in the assignment MIHM101 4 peer referred references needed to be used and CRAAP analysis helped me in finding out which are the genuine ones. One criticality I found though is its impossible to comment on the biasness of the author.

Journal 6

Assignment Preparation

Almost all the universities and colleges provides their student with the assignments these days. Giving assignments are a way to make sure that the student has got the understanding of the topics being discussed in lectures and now is able to use them in practically in lives. Assignment preparation involves the pre planning what are the resources required and what is the allocated time for the assignment. It requires pre planning by researching on the topic given and how to approach it. As per Li, & Hu (2018) the assignments always have some allocated time limit which should be fulfilled along with making sure about the validity of the sources used for information. The assignment often contains some mandatory criterions like the topic, reverences and validity, word limit and the formatting which should be used. Theses mandatory criterions should be fulfilled in order to complete the assignment satisfactorily. 

For me time management and critical thinking is important in pre planning of the assignments. These are the two aspects which should b e focused upon while doing the assignments. It was not easy for me to find journal articles and resources for my topic earlier and therefore, I used to take more time in researching which resulted in the late submission of assignments. However, by taking the help of lecturers and academic writing skills, I was able to pre plan the study time. The strategy I used was to make the subjective draft for the topic of assignment by discussing it with lecturer and then keep updating and modifying it by doing research on the topic. I was able to manage time in this way which lead to the availability of time for finding adequate evidence and therefore, completing assignment on time satisfactorily. Due to availability of time due to time management I was able to critically research the article and information I used and it resulted in my grades going up for assignments.

Journal 7

Planning Study Time

Time management is always of utmost importance for getting success in life. If you will ask all the leaders and successful person of this world about the secret of success, time management would be one of the common factor. Planning the time for study is also that important in the student’s life. A student has to manage so many things in given time. So many assignments have deadlines in universities so student has to prioritize this as per the time given and plan his study time in advance (Kaur, Williams, Thompson, Lasecki, Iqbal, & Teevan, (2018)). If a student plans his study and and make a time table for his daily activities he can maximise and utilize time effectively. It helps a student to organise his time and allocate it according to the the importance of work. The students are able to develop study habits and make strategies to use their time more efficiently if they manage and plan their study time.

It was very difficult for me to manage time and do all the activities and assignments in earlier days of my university. I needed to attend the lectures, research the various topics for assignments. Completing assignments and fulfil all the daily activities. In order to manage all the things, I started assessing available time for me. I used my course Academic skill and research development as guide and took help from the lectures about how to go about the same. I started using a study planner through which I can allocate time to different activities like work, research, assignment, playing, sleeping etc. For example I allocate 2 hours of time for revision of the topic being discussed in the class so that I can make notes of all the relevant things before I forget them after each class. This management of time provides me with lot of free time fore doing researches on topic and utilising time for reading more articles and topic as per my interest and thus let to good academic grades for me. The critical point for me in this the student prioritise the work and time table as per his preference sometime which can be questionable.

Journal 8

Academic Integrity

Academic integrity is the follow up of the values and stick to them even in the face of adversities. It’s a commitment that a person would not change the principle even if the situations are against him. There are 6 fundamental values namely trust, honesty, courage, responsibility, respect and fairness. These values help in making principles which the academic communities follow and take actions by sticking to these principles. According to Monash University, “Academic integrity is the moral code of academia. It involves using, generating and communicating the information in ethical, honest and responsible manner”. Therefore, it means that the academic writing is author’s writing by taking help and ideas. Academic integrity means there should not be may cheating, falsification of facts, fabrication of facts, plagiarism of another’s work, offering and acceptance of bribes. Contract cheating comes under academic integrity as well. It involves not writing the assignment himself but taking the help of family member, friend or any firm and paying them in return of writing the assignment. 

In my country there are no laws against the breach of academic integrity and therefore I was unaware of such term but as I undertook this course I came to know about the consequences. It is very important aspect to avoid the plagiarism and use referencing as per guidelines and I am now aware about both. I now use reference properly when I use any definition, evidence or example and mention the same in my assignment. It is the best way to avoid plagiarism. I use “turn it in” software to find out the grammatical mistakes and similarities I have with any other’s work. It reduces the similarity and plagiarism to great extent. The feedbacks given by it helps in further improving the quality of work.  As per me this strict laws and rules helps in disciplining the student. The way investigation and counselling process are held by the administration is of utmost curiosity for me.

Journal 9

Using Numerical Data

Numerical data is used for used for storing representing numerical records. It shows hoe the amount or volume of any specific thing is increasing or decreasing or have been constant for a time. Mostly tables, line graph and bar graphs are used to demonstrate numeric figure and data. 

I have been using tables and other numerical data from childhood but the academic uses were unknown to me. The results I can get by analysing theme is new thing for me. Study of graphs and statistics are very useful in academic writings. In my course I learned about the uses of graphs, statistics tables and how can these make my research and assignment more qualitative. But I found that it is very difficult to paraphrase tables and graphs. 

Journal 10

Assessment Feedback

In order to analyse the strength and the weaknesses assessment feedbacks are very important as it provides the final feedback. Further knowledge and academic skills are developed because of theses assessments.

As I was not aware of their importance I use to neglect them but after joining this course I get to know about their importance. The assessment feedback gives chance to rectify my mistakes and learn from them. It helps in building my strengths and working on my weaknesses.