It has only been a few months since I started the BS Development Communication course and yet I feel like I already learned so much by doing laboratory exercises such as gathering data, writing assessments, studying the modules, and conducting interviews. All of these experiences have taught me that learning something new will take time and patience. It might take days, weeks, or even months to fully understand a topic or concept. It might even be stressful, but if I manage to push through my personal barriers of pressure and anxiety, I actually find the pleasure in doing such work.
INSIGHTS AND REFLECTIONS
I slowly started to understand how a development communicator in training should think and work. Observation is the number one skill that we must have and practice in our everyday lives. We should observe the people around us so that we know who to approach or even interview about a certain topic. Getting to meet a lot of people gives us an advantage because having connections will help us get closer to the people we really need for our articles. I believe that it would be more hectic and difficult if we have no clue on how to find people in a certain field. Feeling lost could cause more problems.
Ever since I’ve been doing exercises in our laboratory section, I started to appreciate reading all kinds of articles and observe how every writer has their own unique style, and the different types of techniques used to attract certain audiences. I noticed how inferior some articles could be compared to the well-written ones, which I think was made with more effort and dedicated research. I was never the type to like these kind of things but as a student under the BS Development Communication course, it is not something I could avoid.
LESSONS LEARNT
I admit that I have learned a lot from my mistakes. I know I made a lot of errors because of how mindless I get at times but I knew they were part of my whole college experience and worrying about those errors won’t get me anywhere—it’s the learning process that I should focus on. I noticed that I tend to correct a lot of words and sentences in my work even after submitting them. It became a habit of mine and up to this point, I’m not so sure why. It’s most likely because I have a lot of other things to do other than one subject and the satisfaction of clicking the ‘submit’ button is uncontrollable. This made me learn to always double check everything, write drafts, and ask myself if it’s good enough for other people to read because having that kind of mindset pushes me to improve my work.
Another lesson that I’ve learned is to not hesitate to ask more questions when it comes to interviews because when I transcribed my interviewee’s answers, some of it did not make sense and there were parts when the the voice was inaudible. Unfortunately, I had to message the interviewee again about additional questions and I felt embarrassed for bothering them again. Thankfully, they were responsive and kind to reply to my messages.
Lastly, I learned that my topic’s objectives are the ones I should be looking out for. Everything I do—the questions, the outlines, and the whole paper itself but revolve around the objective or else there would be no purpose in writing the article.
Indeed, I have made a lot of mistakes but all of these count as stepping stones for my improvement. I know that I would face more challenges which I know I won’t overcome perfectly. Like any other student, I am still one who has so much space for improvement, and I don’t think I’ll ever be satisfied with my skills and qualities as I want to develop these until the end.
sixtyfifty2021 