Being a primary school kid back then, we were not exactly matured at that period of time. I remembered there was this time at the canteen table where there were two segregated groups: namely the Malays and the Chinese. We did not know one another but somehow we started a very agitated argument. We threw abuses at one another such as “Malays stink,” “Malays are barbi,” “Malays are stupid. ”In primary school,we were probably only aware of our skin colour differences and we tend and preferred to mix around with our own race. The lack of interaction only led to further aggressive feelings towards the other “skin coloured” people.
Certainly in Singapore where the majority is Chinese, some of us do have our own prejudiced views towards other races, sometimes deeming them as being inherently lazy, not as bright in academic or work etc. And I do not deny that my own family did pass down some of these prejudiced views to me since I was young. These stereotyping of other races usually stem from lack of communication, understanding and tolerance towards one another. I myself studied in Chinese schools since secondary school to NUS where Jay and Rathi are the only non-chinese friends I have made in NUS.
In such environments, how often do we really get to interact and understand one another better? Racial Harmony once a year is definitely not enough. More could be done. Perhaps some racial elements could actually be introduced into the school curriculum to increase the awareness of our cultural differences and different values and beliefs and such prejudices would eventually disappear.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Post #3 Business Correspondence Critique
Hi Faculty of Science!
The Science Club Website is revamped and is now ok and ready to go! Do go take a look and read up on the latest happenings in Science!
Cheers~
The website is sciclub.nus.edu.sg and please send any suggestions and/or corrections to sciclub.publications@science.nus.edu.sg.
Thanks!
Regards,
Chia Song Zhe Andy (Mr.)
Publications Director
29th Science Club Management Committee
NUS Students' Science Club
A Constituent Club of the NUS Students' Union
This is an email I have just received today actually from our NUS email inbox.
Below is an analysis of the contents based on 7Cs in writing:
1) Courtesy
This Publications Director actually started off with a “Hi” and words like “cheers” actually made this email sound polite. However, it did not refer the readers as “Dear Science students” but greeted us as “faculty of science” instead. This may not come under the “Adopt a You-Attitude” as “faculty of science” did not have endearing tone to it.
2) Correctness
Basically this email has no grammatical mistakes or spelling mistakes. However, phrases such as “Do go take a look” did sound a bit funny. The “go” word is redundant in this case. Words like “ok” also sounded informal. The format of the email is also incorrect. The “cheers” word in the middle of the email did seem out of place as I thought the email was coming to an end.
3) Conciseness
This is a short and concise email. However some phrases may sound repetitive, such as “ok” and “ready-to-go” means the same thing. Another phrase such as “Do go take a look” is not concise enough.
4) Clarity
This letter is straightforward and it is to inform the students of the new website being set up and encourage them to give any feedback.
5) Coherence
Other than the sudden appearance of the word “cheers” in the middle of the email, this email is coherent and straight to the point.
6) Concreteness
He could have included information for example, “A new photo gallery is added” or “More details about an upcoming pageant competition to be found in the website” to attract more students to take a look at the website. Other than that, the phrasing and words he used are effective in conveying his purpose of publicizing the website to students.
7) Completeness
The last sentence “The website is sciclub.nus.edu.sg” has a slight problem to it. At first glance, I thought this is an email address as it did not have a “www” or “http://” in the sentence. He could have written, “The link to the new website is at http://sciclub.nus.edu.sg” and usually, the hyperlink will automatically appear to allow students to have the convenience of clicking to the website. If not, most students will just glance through the email as there is no obvious hint of where the website address is.
The Science Club Website is revamped and is now ok and ready to go! Do go take a look and read up on the latest happenings in Science!
Cheers~
The website is sciclub.nus.edu.sg and please send any suggestions and/or corrections to sciclub.publications@science.nus.edu.sg.
Thanks!
Regards,
Chia Song Zhe Andy (Mr.)
Publications Director
29th Science Club Management Committee
NUS Students' Science Club
A Constituent Club of the NUS Students' Union
This is an email I have just received today actually from our NUS email inbox.
Below is an analysis of the contents based on 7Cs in writing:
1) Courtesy
This Publications Director actually started off with a “Hi” and words like “cheers” actually made this email sound polite. However, it did not refer the readers as “Dear Science students” but greeted us as “faculty of science” instead. This may not come under the “Adopt a You-Attitude” as “faculty of science” did not have endearing tone to it.
2) Correctness
Basically this email has no grammatical mistakes or spelling mistakes. However, phrases such as “Do go take a look” did sound a bit funny. The “go” word is redundant in this case. Words like “ok” also sounded informal. The format of the email is also incorrect. The “cheers” word in the middle of the email did seem out of place as I thought the email was coming to an end.
3) Conciseness
This is a short and concise email. However some phrases may sound repetitive, such as “ok” and “ready-to-go” means the same thing. Another phrase such as “Do go take a look” is not concise enough.
4) Clarity
This letter is straightforward and it is to inform the students of the new website being set up and encourage them to give any feedback.
5) Coherence
Other than the sudden appearance of the word “cheers” in the middle of the email, this email is coherent and straight to the point.
6) Concreteness
He could have included information for example, “A new photo gallery is added” or “More details about an upcoming pageant competition to be found in the website” to attract more students to take a look at the website. Other than that, the phrasing and words he used are effective in conveying his purpose of publicizing the website to students.
7) Completeness
The last sentence “The website is sciclub.nus.edu.sg” has a slight problem to it. At first glance, I thought this is an email address as it did not have a “www” or “http://” in the sentence. He could have written, “The link to the new website is at http://sciclub.nus.edu.sg” and usually, the hyperlink will automatically appear to allow students to have the convenience of clicking to the website. If not, most students will just glance through the email as there is no obvious hint of where the website address is.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Post #2: Resolving Interpersonal Conflict
Let’s call this guy Friendly. There is no actual setting but this conflict happened over a few days.
There are these two cliques of friends in the same CCA. Friendly is a popular guy and thus, both cliques like to include him in their own clique outings. Let’s call them the 1st clique and 2nd clique. There is this girl named Shorty in the 2nd clique. There is another girl named Tall who is the good friend of Shorty but is outside of the CCA.
Tall knew Friendly through Shorty. Tall seems to like Friendly and always messages him through handphone.
One fine day, Tall asked Friendly, “What are you doing now?”
As Friendly was with the 1st clique in one of the clique’s home, he did not want to let Tall know that he was with the 1st clique as Tall might tell Shorty (who is in the 2nd clique) that he was spending time with the 1st clique as 1st clique did not ask 2nd clique to go.
Thus he replied, “Oh, I am making a birthday card with my friends at home.”
However, Tall told Shorty that Friendly was at his own home during that fatefulday. And Shorty found out through someone’s blog that Friendly was with the 1st clique in someone else’s home on the same fateful day.
Shorty was mad and she thought that Friendly was telling a big fat lie. Thus, she blogged about this whole event, saying that Friendly is someone who wants the best of both worlds and has no mind of his own.
Friendly read Shorty’s blog and got very pissed. Thus, a major quarrel broke out.
How would Friendly feel? Does he know the actual reason behind this whole conflict? What do you think Friendly should have done? What do you think could have been done to prevent this conflict?
There are these two cliques of friends in the same CCA. Friendly is a popular guy and thus, both cliques like to include him in their own clique outings. Let’s call them the 1st clique and 2nd clique. There is this girl named Shorty in the 2nd clique. There is another girl named Tall who is the good friend of Shorty but is outside of the CCA.
Tall knew Friendly through Shorty. Tall seems to like Friendly and always messages him through handphone.
One fine day, Tall asked Friendly, “What are you doing now?”
As Friendly was with the 1st clique in one of the clique’s home, he did not want to let Tall know that he was with the 1st clique as Tall might tell Shorty (who is in the 2nd clique) that he was spending time with the 1st clique as 1st clique did not ask 2nd clique to go.
Thus he replied, “Oh, I am making a birthday card with my friends at home.”
However, Tall told Shorty that Friendly was at his own home during that fatefulday. And Shorty found out through someone’s blog that Friendly was with the 1st clique in someone else’s home on the same fateful day.
Shorty was mad and she thought that Friendly was telling a big fat lie. Thus, she blogged about this whole event, saying that Friendly is someone who wants the best of both worlds and has no mind of his own.
Friendly read Shorty’s blog and got very pissed. Thus, a major quarrel broke out.
How would Friendly feel? Does he know the actual reason behind this whole conflict? What do you think Friendly should have done? What do you think could have been done to prevent this conflict?
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