Week 9: 2008 Summer Olympics held in Beijing - Nellie

Hey guys, Nellie here! :> This week's task is to choose any 1 of the 4 pictures given and to reflect on the event it represents. I decided to choose the picture depicting the Beijing National Stadium (a.k.a The Bird's Nest) which was used as a venue to host 2008 Summer Olympics Opening and Closing Ceremony. When the capital of China, Beijing, was awarded the games over 4 other competitors, it was definitely a great pride to China!

In order to make the Games more exuberant and grand, China specially built this stadium to host both the opening and closing ceremony! Seeing the amount of thought and effort put into designing and building this stadium, we can see how China really treasured this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to host such a big scale international competition! 

It was a significant event for China. The 2008 Summer Olympics journey had both its ups and downs! During the Olympics, despite the many disputes and protests that broke out, China managed to overcome those obstacles and successfully ended the whole event with a grand Closing Ceremony. 

From this, we can see that despite the obstacles and challenges we might face in life, we should not give up, however, we should persevere on to the very end, because that is when we taste the sweetness of success, that is when we feel the sense of accomplishment!

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Week 9 : History of China --- Geraldine

Hey readers! We were told to choose a picture, share our thoughts about it and its importance in China history. So this is the picture I have chosen:

Yup, the Great Wall of China.

The Great Wall of China is a really magnificent structure to me, and also something that up till today I still think is something really amazing because... it just didn't seem to be possible to build such a great structure whereby it's so long that no one can finish exploring the whole structure without getting extremely tired and thirsty. So I feel that it's a really great achievement of the Chinese to be able to build such a huge structure that must have taken a lot of hard work and sacrifices and we should all appreciate its presence and not take it lightly because its simply done by the hard work of many people and having such a structure around is a really rare thing.

Well, so just a little bit about its background, the Great Wall's construction began under the first emperor of the Qin Dynasty following the unification of China in 221 B.C. The individual states of Northern China already had been building their own walls for several centuries, and the emperor ordered them linked.Construction of the Great Wall spanned nearly two millennia, continuing until the Ming Dynasty in the 1500s. Over that time, more than 20 dynasties built the wall according to the technology of their time, and the Ming Dynasty built most of the wall that remains today. It is built for defense of the Chinese.

• The Great Wall would be important to the Chinese because it is important to their history and is also one of the seven wonders of the world, which they should feel fortunate and honored to have in their own country.

  • One thing I feel that we can learn from this Great Wall is perseverance because only if we do not give up will we then be able to succeed in our goals,succeed in making an achievement. Without the Chinese' perseverance and hard work, the Great Wall would not have been completed or existed. There wouldn't be a structure called the Great Wall of China.

  
  

  
  

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Week 9: China Historical Event ~ SHU TING

21st October, 2011, a man set himself on fire in Tiananmen Square To protest against China's communist justice system. 

I think that at that time, not everyone was happy with the way China was being ruled. Although communism provides efficiency ( eg. China doesn't have to go through votes among hundreds of senators-when the government wants to get something done, it gets done ) , it also has its drawbacks.  It has come to the point that majority of the Chinese support this system, that the minority are neglected so much so that this man has to risk his own life in order to draw attention to their plight. It really is a tragic thing to hear. 

The Chinese government should constantly look into every aspect of their people's lives and identify who are those feeling upset and dissatisfied with the system. I think this man was directly insulting the system as he carried out his self-immolation in Tiananmen Square which was the heart and symbol of a Communist China. Maybe China has to change its traditional ways. In the past, China was split into dynasties along history timeline. Since the beginning, it has been a communist country and was still carrying out this political tradition in the modern world.

So guys, we can all get something out of this interesting event in China. Communism does not come as a flawless government system. Everything is up to the government and the people's voices are not represented. Sooner or later, it would end up being corrupted. That's when the government has to step in and do something about it. Seek the thoughts of the people. After all, where would they be if they didn't have followers? The government should be for the people, of the people and by the people.

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Week 7/8 Chingay Presentation ~ Reuben :D

Hey everybody! I am going to talk about my feelings towards the past few weeks of Chingay presentation. Firstly, Chingay parade is an event that we had attended a few weeks ago. 

We had to present what we learnt from Chingay, and we as a group were very nervous. Our group presented second, so we had the benefit of the like first few groups (so we will be judged a little leniently! 😁) I feel that our group had put much work into the presentation, such as preparing slides and memorizing scripts.

During the presentation, I was actually quite nervous, and stumbled my speech sometimes. Furthermore, I know that I always slur my speech, so well it didn't go quite well for me. While the other group mates were speaking, I had nothing to do except to maintain eye contact with the audience which was kinda embarrassing. (Like paiseh) 

I feel that I could have improved by speaking louder and clearly, memorizing my speech , not refering to my que cards and maintaining more eye contact withh the audience. Using my hands to have more hand-action to emphasize on some points of Chingay.

Overall, I felt that my group had done a pretty good job, I need to be more confident in speaking and had taught me the aspects of Chingay.

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Week 7/8 Chingay Oral Presentation Reflection ~ Shu Ting

Hi guys! Our group has finished and presented the Chingay Presentation! Yayyy! I'm so glad that it's been gotten over and done with because of the large amount of time I spent doing the slides. I really enjoyed presenting in front of the whole class who were such good audience and didn't jeer at us or throw potatoes at us. *bows in respect* I remember being very nervous while Mr Chua was choosing which groups to present that and low and behold our group was chosen. I was glad that I was mainly in charge of clicking the slides as I would have felt awkard as to where to look or do whilst my fellow group member was presenting. 

I feel that I could have done much better as a presenter, though. I could literally feel my legs shaking as I went through my part in the presentation, and was apprehensive when I had to look up at the audience for eye contact. Personally, I think I should have memorised majority of the script before the presentation. But I had no time! Why? Because I blessed with the skill of procrastination. That is something I am working on at the moment.

To be honest, I am quite happy that our group was one of the first to present. As we are all presenting on Chingay, the more presentations are held, the more basic and unoriginal it gets. It also shows that we have totally come prepared for the lesson and would not have any plans on copying elements from another group's presentation. COPYRIGHT MATTERS!

Overall, the presentation has made me more aware that I enjoy public speaking, but I need a confidence booster. Along the way, it has also taught me more about Chingay, the values of the parade and the good qualities to adopt in giving oral presentations! :)

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Week 7/8: Chingay Oral Presentation Reflection ---- Geraldine

Hey readers! Just here to share about my reflection of this whole Chingay presentation! :)

Basically, this whole presentation was formed with A LOT of effort from our group. We took up a lot of time to the point whereby I don't even have the time to do my own homework. Fortunately, I think it all proceeded quite well and our efforts were perhaps not fruitless after all! :)

Of course, during this whole process, I learnt a lot of things,especially regarding skills of oral presentation. I learnt that we should always be confident because only then will we be able to speak loudly and only then will the audiences' attention not waver about. I also find that perhaps we should smile more because, from the audience point of view, I realized that I will pay more attention to more cheerful people as compared to those who have a very serious face. When speaking, our tones should also have variations to prevent a monotonous presentation and also, hand movements should also be included to emphasise on the key points and also to not make the whole presentation look so "dead".  We should also try to memorize our script and not look at the script most of the time because this will cause us to have less chances of making eye-contact with the audience.And oh I almost forgot.Eye-contact.We should also make eye-contact with the audience around us so that it would not look as if we are talking to ourselves.In my opinion, in fact, I feel that making eye-contact is somehow a minor interaction with the audience, which is something we need to capture the audiences' attention.

Overall, this whole presentation has taught me a lot in terms of speaking skills as well as the history and more of Chingay due to research we did in the process. It was indeed a really fruitful and meaningful process to create this whole presentation as I have benefitted from it greatly! :)

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