Year 2, Semester 2

PL3234 Developmental Psychology

Lecturers: Dr Nina Powell
Dr Powell is really nice, but she speaks really fast. for the first time ever, i had to slow down my e lecture to catch what she is saying haha! She also gave us many hints for our mid term and finals, so it was kinda easier to study for it! Her slides are rather neat and she uses a blended classroom teaching style. She uses many videos during class, which makes lectures really enjoyable! Dr Powell engages us with socrative quizzes to help test our understanding of what we had learnt during the week's e-lecture, which makes lectures even more enjoyable! i didn't skip a single lecture of her's because it's so fun to go hahaha! the best thing about Dr Powell is that her exams are not cumulative and what is not covered in class from the textbook is not tested! so essentially we did not have to read our textbooks for this module because her notes were sufficient :-)

Weightage: 
20% Tutorial activities & presentations
40% mid term
40% finals
Tutorial activities included a group work for every fortnightly tutorial that needed to be submitted at the end of class, so there was barely any homework for this module. group work was based on what we had learnt, applying it to real life situations. it was enjoyable as well because tutorial was interactive between our tutor and our group mates! Presentations were not slides presentations but rather how we presented our answers for our group work. each group would take about 5 minutes to explain their work at our own tables, which makes it extra chill! 

Exam format: close book
50 MCQ
6C5 SAQ 
MCQs were rather tricky but they were manageable. her SAQs were really short, requiring only half a page of answers only! the best part is, she lets us answer in point form, as long as we put our point across. Dr Powell is really flexible with our answering style which makes it less stressful. top it up with her countless hints during class, the paper was manageable. 

Workload: 3.5/5
i would say that the workload is slightlyyy heavier but it's not as bad as what my seniors have described. Dr Powell's e-lectures would take up to the most 30 minutes of my week, which is very manageable! her content is not too heavy either. but revision was tricky because she said that she would test us themes revolving around the development stuff, which is not taught directly in class hence more thinking was needed during revision. but memory work was not too bad either because Dr Powell took out a lot of the content and summarised the remaining content. 

Tutorial Format:

tutorials were held fortnightly so it was not too bad. but the group work was rather rough and i did not do too well for it. it required more thinking in dept and there was a lot of readings for tutorials. but they were not tested and it was alright to not read the readings for class hahaha. i had very lovely group mates tho and we got along really well! they made class more enjoyable :) 

overall, i enjoyed this module! the workload was not too bad and the content was not too heavy as expected. i didn't enjoy the content entirely because it isn't my field of interest, but it was good enough. watching the videos in class made the content come to life which helps application and memory work even better! 

PL3236 Abnormal Psychology

Lecturers: Dr Marc Oliver Suendermann

it was Dr S's first time lecturing and i should give him a benefit of doubt, right? hahaha. ah he was nice, but he kinda mumbles and every lecture he'd says something like can you please lower down your volume or please move to the front, but nobody moves haha. he'd say the formal when there is a LOW mumble going on at the back of the lecture hall and he'd say that it's distracting. ????. but okay since it's his first time teaching i guess he was not used to non-total silence. his slides are kinda messy too, but he showed us some videos during lectures so class wasn't THAT bad. 

Weightage: 

15% class presentation 

10% participation

15% mid terms

60% finals

the module was really chill actually! we only had 1 class presentation on a case study and participation points could be earned by just answering one question or asking one during class (i think!). i personally felt that mid terms had more to memorize than finals, it's odd that the weightage is so different. 

Exam format: close book

100 MCQ midterm

50 MCQ final + 1 Case Vignette - 5 SAQ 

there was so much to memorize for midterms omgosh it was quite terrible. i must say that the content is heavier than developmental actually. although mcq for finals were not cumulative, but the case vignette included every chapter. i died revising for this module because there was too much to remember! 
one good thing was that the lecturer took most of the mcq from the question bank. although he didn't give us the access code for the current edition's question bank, we managed to find the previous edition's bank and practiced on it. it came in really handy and useful! the case vignette questions were the same as previous year's questions, but only a different disorder for each case, so it was easier to prepare for it. i do have 2 sets of question banks that i'm selling, if you are interested, do leave a comment!

Workload: 4/5

i'd say that this module has the heaviest workload among all my modules this sem bcos of the extremely heavy content. the presentation did not take up too much time but a significant effort is needed to be put into it as it was not an informal lighthearted presentation. i enjoyed going for tutorials too because my tutor was really lovely and the presentations were interesting!

Tutorial Format:

tutorials were held fortnightly too with 2 groups presenting per lesson. the presentation took as long as 40 minutes, including Q&A. many groups had cue cards during the presentation as the script was longer than our usual presentations. but it was informative and interesting to read about the various case studies! there were no readings for this module too :)

overall, i enjoyed this mod more than developmental psych because of the content! it was eye opening to read about the different disorders and watching videos of real patients; it brings the content to life! listening to my tutor's stories about her different experiences is very inspiring too :) i'd recommend yall to take this mod w a lighter psych mod or to take fewer psych mods with this as the content can be very taxing. 

SW2104 Human Development Over Lifespan

Lecturers: Dr Ong Teck Hong

Dr Ong is a very knowledgable lecturer, no surprise because he has been lecturing the same module for over 15 years! i heard that the time and venue had not change too until this semester. although his slides were very messy and the formatting was terrible (many of us had to reformat for neater notes!), they were very very summarised and simple, which makes revision much easier. He also has a collection of newspapers with news dating back to 1993! he'd show us numerous newspaper articles during lecture so it's essential to go for class bcos he said that he'd test on the articles! (but he didn't lol) however, lectures can get a bit boring as he just reads off the slides. i think many of us went for the newspaper articles only hahaha oopsies. 

Weightage: 

40% Group project

60% finals

60% finals is pretty crazy! our group project included 1 group project on playgrounds and 1 debate. which means that each project carried a high weightage itself too! there was no mid terms for this, which i'm really grateful for :)

Exam format: open book

2 essays

finals was 60 marks with 2 questions. it was Dr Ong's first time making this an open book exam, changing the format of the paper as well. it was a good thing that it's open book because there's so much to remember (13 weeks of content!) despite the summarised content. many of us referred to the notes during the exam so it's handy to get the textbook! actually i think i referred more to the textbook than my notes during the exam, although there wasn't much of a need to read the textbook beforehand as Dr Ong would have picked up the main points in his lecture slides. i'll be selling the textbook too, let me know (in the comments) if you'd like to purchase it! we used the textbook by Santrock :) 

Workload: 2/5

workload for this is relatively light after the 2 group projects. as my group had 5 of us, the workload for each of us was thus lighter. the playground group work was enjoyable because we get to go to a real playground to observe children and explore the equipments! the debate was also manageable because the other group that was on the same debating side as my group shared their content document with us so we did not have to research as much, and we contributed to their document too! win-win hehe :) there were no readings for this mod too yay!

Tutorial Format:

tutorials were held fortnightly as well. most of the time we had presentations for our group project, some times our tutor would spend the whole time talking and it was interesting to hear his point of views. he was very patient and knowledgable. my group was absolutely lovely, thank God for great group mates who were efficient and friendly!

overall, i enjoyed this module because the content overlapped with developmental psych hahaha. revision was easier as well as the theories portion would have overlapped with dev psych and the content was rather commonsensical. despite this, it was nice to learn about how we grow as humans throughout our lifespan, the changes we undergo and what had been happening over the news. the newspaper articles helped our learning by showing us that what we learn is real and still happens. i'd recommend this mod to those who are taking dev psych too! and even if you aren't, it is a nice and relatively easier module to take :)

CH1101e: Retelling Chinese Stories: Change and Continuity

Lecturers: Prof Koh Khee Heong

Prof Koh is super knowledgable about chinese stories, he makes classes really enjoyable! his lectures were very structured and his slides were clean and short. his teaching style was very different, we had alternate weeks of movies and lessons during lectures! for example, we'd spend 1 week learning about mulan and the contextual background and we'd spend the following week's lecture watching  mulan. how cool is that! most chill mod ever! although he spoke in mandarin for certain lectures and i struggled to keep up, thankfully he translated what he said most of the time. we watched 5 movies in total over the sem!

Weightage: 100% CA

20% Class participation

30% Presentation & Term Paper

25% 1st Quiz

25% 2nd Quiz

class participation is really important bcos it carried a higher weightage than your average mod. we just had to answer the presenting group's questions or ask them anything. my tutor was very nice, he told us that he'd give us a standard 70% for every tutorial and if we speak up, we'd get a higher percentage! so everyone is kinda safe. the term paper was a group work about our presentation, of which was about one of the movies that we are assigned to. the presentation was pretty chill too as the content we had to present was straightforward. as the groups are pretty big, about 5-6 people, the workload per person for the slides was little and manageable. 

Exam format: open book

1 essay each

the quizzes were manageable, but you haveta study for it because it's just 1 question about the multiple movies at once. i actually enjoyed writing the essay and there was little pressure in the lecture hall. this is the first time a quiz was so chill hahaha. i'd say that the tutor and the lecturer were pretty lenient towards all of us so we did relatively well for our quizzes :) 

Workload: 1/5

i'd give this the lightest workload because we spent half of our lectures watching movies haha! the readings were slightly painful but it was informative and interesting. we didn't have to prepare for tutorials also except for the week we are presenting. and our term essays were due 1 week after our respective tutorials so crunch time was only for 1 week. 

Tutorial Format:

one point to note though, the presentation can be done in either mandarin or english. my tutor was from china and he spoke really fast mandarin during class and i didn't catch a single thing he said.. my group did our presentation in english but the 2 exchange students did it in mandarin, and i found out that he gave higher marks to the 2 who spoke mandarin instead... so yeap... 

there was 1 presentation per fortnight tutorial and we didn't have to prepare anything much for the tutorial except our listening ears :) although there were readings for this mod, i feel that it was only supplementary and it was alright not to read it as it was not tested during the quizzes; it just helped us understand the societal background better!

overall, this was the best mod of my sem! i enjoyed it so much despite my very poor mandarin. 10/10 for CH1101e! i totally recommend yall to take it to clear your basket or as a UE. it actually sparked interest to other chinese history for me, i'm kinda thinking of taking another CH-related mod next sem haha, that's how good this module is for someone who can barely speak nor write in chinese :) so don't worry if you aren't proficient in your mandarin because i survived it and so can you! hahaha

GES1005: Everyday Life of Chinese Singaporeans

Lecturers: Prof Kenneth Dean

Prof Dean is a westerner teaching a chinese module in english. this totally blew my mind during the first lecture! he is so knowledgable about the temples in singapore and the chinese culture here. he spends most of the time during lecture rambling about his exciting findings and does not follow the course schedule. it was really tough for us to follow him because he doesn't really follow his slides nor schedule. although he had many slides, they were just slides of pictures so it was not very handy for revision. i didn't enjoy his lectures at all and going for it was a dread because i would always walk out of the LT not knowing what i've learnt sadly.. but my friend and i still went for it in case he'd say something about the quiz or our project that can help us haha.. the attendance for the module was really bad too despite the high headcount. 

Weightage: 

10% Tutorial attendance, discussion

10% Presentation

40% 2 Quizzes

15% Field report on temple visit using app

15% Written report on temple visit (group essay)

10% Written summary on family history

i like how the weightage is well spread out. the module pretty much revolved around our temple visiting project, where we would form our own groups and were assigned a temple to visit. at the temple, we had to interview the people who serve in the temple and observe / take pictures and videos of the different artefacts and architecture of the temple. we'd then submit our photos and videos through a specially designed app for the module, and then present about our visit during tutorial. however, my group was slightly different. as we were not comfortable going to a temple, our tutor let us choose a place of worship to visit, so we decided to visit my church and do a report on it! it was very interesting for me as i got to learn more about my church's history and current news. 

the written essay on our own family history was similar to what i did in GET1002. 

Exam format: No exams, closed book

1 take home quiz in week 6
1 final quiz in week 12
both quizzes were our thoughts about certain readings that prof dean assigned us. it was not easy at all because the writing was either too sophisticated or i had no idea what the article was about even after reading it countless times. these 2 essays were one of my most uncertain essays i have written in my uni life sigh.. but thankfully, the first quiz was a take home assignment so we could do it at our own pace. we had our second quiz in class.  

Workload: 3/5

i'd give a 3 because there were many readings, tho irrelevant to our revision or quizzes if they were not included in the assigned readings for the quizzes.. i felt that i wasted my time reading through most of the readings as they did not really help during lecture either. but i did spend a significant amount of time going through the readings.. the take home assignment was rather time consuming as well because i didn't understand the assigned reading so crafting an essay about it was a challenge. the group report was quite time consuming as well, surprisingly. but it's less painful when you have lovely group mates, thank God for lovely group mates hehe!

Tutorial Format:

tutorials were also held fortnightly! each tutorial had a different agenda and i must say that it was quite interesting. we'd talk about our family histories, ghost stories, temple visits and more. 

overall, i wouldn't recommend yall to take this module unless the lecturer changed. initially, i wanted to take this module because of the fun schedule that was listed, but it turns out much different than i expected. i also took it because the course assessment changed. there was a field work and interview in the previous semesters and this semester was a temple visit, which was something i'd rather do that a field interview haha. okay i kinda enjoyed this module except for the lecture and readings part. other than that, my group mates were nice and i knew most of them through college and church! 

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i can't believe i'm already halfway through my uni life!
i really enjoyed this semester because of the modules that i took, and it was not too hectic during the semester and during exams as well. although mid terms were a mad crunch and mad rush, the period after that (week 7 onwards) were pretty chill and i had no assignments to submit, so i had more free time than my previous sems! i was really happy because i got to use the time to meet my friends that i have not met in a long time, had good food over greater fellowship :-) i'm really thankful that i had minimal individual essays to write this semester because i'm so bad at them! i also enjoyed all the modules that i took, except for the small moments that lectures were boring and readings were painful. but the content overall was interesting and i'm so thankful to be studying what i'm studying now :-) 
although, because i only took 2 psych mods this sem, it means that i'd have to take more psych mods next sem which is quite daunting for me.. quite scared actually but ah i'll get there when i get there.
i also had CAC+US this semester and i was worried that it'd take up a significant amount of time that'd eat into my studying time but thankfully it didn't because the performance date was pushed forward just when tutorials had started. so i wasn't lagging too much behind after the performance too. 
God has been very amazing this semester. it was not as rough as my previous semesters, but every semester is a new adventure with Jesus. there was a constant battle i had to face daily this sem, something different, something foreign. it tested my trust in God. and every time i was tempted by thoughts of lousiness and worries, i had to constantly remind myself that God has a greater plan for me, God will only give me the best. and my definition of best may not be the same as God's definition for me, but one thing i know for sure is that God's definition of best for me will be earth shaking ground trembling hehehee. i'm even more happy that i got to spend more time with my church friends this semester, catching up with them in the middle of the semester. it's so easy to be blown away by the many attention grabbing activities in uni, i'm really thankful to have friends of Godly influence to ground me in Christ in the midst of the storms :) 

i hope that you had a wonderful sem as well! enjoy every single moment in uni, time passes way too fast here :) remember that you aren't defined by your grades, but by what you do, how you treat others, what you do for others, how you treat yourself. there's more to life than just grades because it's just a number after all. and in the long run, it's hard work and effort that brings us to greater heights in our careers! 

God bless!