Reflective Journal 5: Reflect
on SES. You may want to consider
the curriculum, the learning process, the assessment, difficulties you faced,
how you overcame them, and how might SES be applicable in time to come.
We have taken SES for one and a half term. During the valuable time, I
really had a deeper insight about the society in China and America.
As a PRC scholar, I have learnt more about Chinese society. To be
honest, at the beginning of Term 1, I felt quite uncomfortable that we regarded
China as a Confucian society. When I was in China, ‘Confucianism’ is seldom
mentioned and I felt that everything went on just like what it should be. It
was a bit strange for me to link China directly to Confucianism. However, as we
did more case studies and reached the core of the issue, it started to make
sense to me. Although Chinese do not often say ‘We do it because of
Confucianism’ like Americans saying ‘We do it because of our rights and freedom’,
the ideology really influences Chinese in all respects of the society,
including how Chinese behave and how Chinese companies are run. The reason why
I could not feel it is because I am so used to behave according to the rules of
Confucianism which are hidden in subconscious, just like a Chinese saying ‘Stand-by
see more than gamesters’.
SES let us see more mostly by reading and
discussing. Before every lesson, we can get access to adequate and useful
readings giving us background information and experts’ ideas. Once there were
too many readings and we suffered from the preparation, but the split of the
questions is a perfect solution as we can focus on one question, while the
interconnection between the questions can help us understand other questions under
the same topic without much difficulties. Then we can enjoy the readings as
they bring us interesting facts and ideas. Class discussion is when we can
exchange thoughts and condense them. There are sometimes debates and they make
us scrutinise the problem and have a more comprehensive view. At first, I was a
bit worried about taking part in the discussion as I confess that I am
sometimes too shy to express my opinion, partly due to Confucian ideology and
the rote learning in China. However, as I gradually got adapted to the
environment, I became more confident about sharing my ideas. Improvement in
this respect will be beneficial, not only for SES, but also for the future. I
have not done my presentation yet, but I believe that I will do well after
watching others’ presentations and learn from their lessons. Another task of
SES is to write reflective journals. It sometimes makes me ponder the
viewpoints we have discussed in class, but it is usually a recapitulation of
what we have learnt and how we ourselves perceive the issues according to
individual experiences, i.e. a process of linking what we learn with the real
life. To require comments on each other’s journal is a wise decision as it gives
us the chance to learn from each other and help mutually. It is very like the peer
review in Google in the purpose of encouraging creativity.
Though what we learnt about China and America
seems a little far away from real life application now as we are still students
in Singapore, the knowledge prepares us for the coming future. Our school aims
to nurture global leaders, so it is important for us to have a high CQ and know
about the two big countries’ different societies in order to collaborate with
people from China and America. Also, Singapore’s nature determines that its
economy can only flourish with foreign investment and interaction with countries
all over the world. After so many SES lessons, we have a better idea of what has
happened, what is happening and what is going to happen in the world. This leads
to a clearer worldview which will be helpful after we step into the society.
By the way, I want to give one suggestion about
the readings. Can we have more readings written by Chinese? Since we are
comparing the society of China and America, it is better to hear voice from
both sides. At present, most of our readings are from the Westerner’s angle of
view. I agree that their vision is very good, but after all, Chinese and
Westerners often see the problems differently because of different ideologies
and habits. If we can read about Chinese’s point of view, our perception about
the issue may be more holistic. Also, we can do a comparison of the different
views and apply what we have learnt. Thus, we can have a better understanding
without any bias. Websites like People’s Daily may be a good source of
articles.
I hope that our learning journey will continue
smoothly and beneficially in the time to come. (786 words)
Dear Huiyao,
回复删除I found your reflective journal extremely insightful. I always had the impression that China is a Confucian society, and that Confucianism is very widespread in China. However, when both Zhenghao and you denied that fact, I discovered something new about China. In my opinion, this is a perfect example of why class discussions are beneficial for us. We get exposed to very diverse points of view and I am very glad that I learnt something new about China beyond what can be learnt from the readings.
In my opinion, the splitting of questions is a great solution as well, and I am very thankful Miss Yeo implemented this system. With this, we can concentrate on the question assigned to us, and research more in-depth for it. During class discussions, we are exposed to the responses to other questions, and thus we still get to learn together as a community, not shortchanging us of any learning opportunities.
In your reflective journal, you also mentioned that being more confident about sharing your ideas would be beneficial for the future. I strongly believe you should have been clearer and elaborated on your stand. In my opinion, such skills can allow us to be active contributors during meetings in companies in the future, and also to build friendly relationships with others.
In addition, you stated that it is important for us to have a high cultural quotient and to understand the societies of China and America so as to be excellent global leaders in the future. I do agree with the fact that cultural quotient is important, but I disagree with your statement about it being useful when we collaborate with Chinese or Americans. In my opinion, the future is very unpredictable, and the future economic superpowers may not be China or America. Therefore, the skills of adaptability and how to find out more about a country’s culture should be the major takeaways from this elective, instead of just the content knowledge.
Furthermore, you proposed a suggestion for SES to be improved. I am of the view that this suggestion is excellent as discovering and understanding different points of view is essential for learning. That is why we have class discussion in the first place. Therefore, understanding issues, especially controversial ones, from China’s perspective is of paramount importance. To build on your suggestion, I feel that we can even look at other sources from other countries to know their take on certain issues, in order to have an even clearer picture of what we are discussing.
All in all, I enjoyed myself reading your reflective journal as it was extremely insightful and I identified largely with what you were saying. The suggestion you offered is a great one, in my view, and I sincerely hope it would be implemented, as it has multiple benefits which come with it. The only disadvantage of it is that the workload would increase significantly, but for a better learning experience, this is an essential move.
Thank you.
Regards,
3S129
Dear Huiyao:
回复删除I agree with you that class discussion is a very good method to study. During class we can share our ideas with our classmates, and sometimes we “attack” each other’s viewpoints to make our opinions more holistic and objective. The class becomes very lively in this way.
I also agree with you that we may have more articles written by Chinese. After coming to Singapore, I realized that many articles that I had read were all perspectives from Chinese. That made my views sometimes different from my classmates’. After exposing to more western views, I found that my perspectives become more holistic and less biased than before. I think it is the same for my classmates who seldom read about perspectives from Chinese in China. As China and America are the main economies that we will keep studying at, it would be helpful to analyze different people’s opinions and perspectives to make ours more holistic and objective.
Best wishes
Wang Zhenghao