12/6/2013 ALMOST THE END

In today's class we were discussing the final presentation. We are approaching the end of the trimester.

We have eveything done ( almost ). We continued working for the project with my mates. Inaddition to improving my activities that need to be enhanced.

11/6/2013 misunderstanding

Today a new thing happened to me that changed everything I did in this subject. The professor has corrected my activities, and I was shocked when seeing the grades. Even though the activities were well done, I got low grades in all of them. I decided to talk with the professor.

I went to the office of the professor and she told me you got to modify the activities as for each activity I have delivered the report and the excercise in the same document which is wrong which I did not know untill today.

I got to separate the report from the work of the activity and then to resubmit them.

MORE WORK BUT FOR BETTER GRADES

6/6/2013 working on the project

On today's seesion we did no more activities. The profesor proposed to work on the team project.

We were talking me and my classmates about the weight of the work for each one of us. We discussed who will present and who will do other task.

In principle, I will be one of the presenters. However we did not take a final decission.

5/6/2013 Final projects

In today's class we were supposed to came to the class and being assigned to a group project. basically there were six groups and me must be within any of them. the topic is to be selected by the group members. However it should be explained prior to the professor.

In my case, we have linked a project that is being done for other subject. Basically our topic in the other subject is to design an aircraft for the year 2040 and later on to present this project in this class but getting rid of the technical data and just putting the advantages and disadvantages. So basically to sell this aircraft ( theoritically ). the presentation must last 5 minutes no more.

4/6/2013 Reviewing the SWOT analysis

In today's session we started with the normal revision of the last day's session, and then we switched to the new session.

Today, we have revised the SWOT analysis activities. Basically some of our class mates got on the platform of the class and explained the things that they have done regarding the analysis that they did for their pairs.

They were not bad. We commented upon them and clarified some important things in doing this kind of analysis.

30/5/2013 no more activities

As of today, we are not going to do any more activities. The upcoming classes are just to improve our previous activities, and to ask the professor for any doubts.

Moreover, if we have any reports to be delivered, we got to show them to the professor to assure that they are written in the proper way.

29/5/2013 finishing the pervious session

As we used to do , we revised the minute of the day before and a blog of the person who did the minute, in addition to revising an activity which has been done by the person doing the minute of today.

Afterwards, we continued to finish the session of the day before ( presenting the presentations about witing skills ) all the groups did pretty well. We did comment some few mistakes that they have done, but thery were not a lot.

Before the end of the class, we summarized the most important ideas of writing skills, and they were helpful for writing effectiveness.

28\5\2013 Writing skills

In today's class we have done the daily work. Afterwards we started presenting. All the groups did pretty well. The ideas about writing skills were transmitted clearly.

We did not get enough time to continue with the interview. Thereby we decided to make them for the next class.

23\5\2013 Interview

After taking the attendence, the professor explained a new activity, which is some skills on writing. We got to have teams of three people and to highlight the most important things we consider important with respect to the topic that we have been assigned to. Moreover we got to prepare for the next day's presentation ( we got to present the things we highlighted ) but without using powerpoint ( any other tool except powerpoint ).

While we were working in the class the professor started to do the interviews explained on the previous post of the blog. My turn to do the interview came when the class has finished, therfore its going to be delayed till the next class.

21\5\2013 exam

In today's class we got to do an exam provided by professionals online. we did nothing more than the exam in the class. the exam is basically testing your abilities to communicate and to choose the best option amongest many ones. The professor was the secretary of the day. attendence wasn't taken as the exam could be done at home.

16/5/2013 SWOT analysis

In today's class after doing the daily work, we started to talk about new things. First the professor will talk to each one of the class members in the next week about his expectations about the course and the grade he expect to get. It is sort of negotiation, thereby if you really know how to communicate and to justify reasons you will win the case and you obtain the grade you expected, otherwise the professor will win the case and give you the grade she wants.

Second, we got to revise one's activities and to do the SWOT analysis about his activities. The selection process was random.

14/5/2013 Real situations (assertiveness)

In today's class after doing the daily work revieing the minute and an activity, we finished the last topic of assertiveness. We had to discuss some real positions of us in which assertiveness, passiveness, or aggressiveness was involved.

I said my case to the public which was requesting from a professor to advance the final exam for me due to some constriants. However she refused at the begining in an aggressive way even though I was so assertive and I didn't go aggressive as she was. She said that she is going to talk with the department about that. I was so sure that I will win the case. Indeed I won and my exam will be advanced.

Before the end of the classs, the professor provided us some disturbing positions. We got to see if any happened to us and to say to the class how we acted.

18/4/2013 New rules

It seems old the date of the post. However in the 9th of May the professor established new rule which is ( to pass the course you must have at least one post in the blog per class) thereby I must post this post even though it is late. In the 18th of April I didn't go to class due to some exams, and thereby I couldn't know what to do. I asked the professor and she said you can find the information in the minute of the missing class.

Basically what happened in that class is improving the quality of activity 3&4. I remind you that activity 3&4 were about wrting and correcting emails. Tereby in the class the professor suggested to write an introduction in making the report of the activity ( the statement ) in order to facilitate the work. Also to put the available resources if available.Finally in each activity we must write a conclusion to finlize the activity.

9/5/2013 New changes

In today's class the professor made new changes concerning the logo of the university. It's no longer UEM which stands for UNIVERSIDAD EUROPEA DE MADRID. It is now just UE so the EUROPEAN UNIVERSITY.

Concerning the daily work, she has done some changes as well. we are no longer reviewing the wiki of the secretary each class. We will only review the blog of the last secretary, in addition to riviewing an activity of the current secretary.

8/5/2013 Assertive techniques

In today's class I was absent for some reasons. However the class talked about some assertive techniques and how to use them.

There was an activity to be done in groups. We got to search for some videos in the internet related to the techniques we have seen in the presentation of the teacher, and then to cite each link in a word document in a proper way. I hadn't got group as I was absent however I put myself into a group with a lower number of members in order to balance all the groups. I got some tasks to do and I performed them.

My personal reflections about the videos. The videos were useful and explained the techniques in a real way. Moreover for those who did not understand very well the styles I recommend them to watch some kind of videos in order to make things clear.

7/5/2013 Saying NO

In today's class we continued with the topic assertiveness. However we have seen some new styles of assertiveness. Those styles are how to say no in a constructive way. Suppose that you are an employee and your manager requests some work to be done in a very short period of time, and you haven't got sufficient time to fulfil the task successfully. In this case in order to be respectful with your manager and not to get fired, you got to say i can't but in a constructive style.

In the activity we have done in couples, I took the role of the manager while my class mate took the role of the employee to perform the excercise supposed above. My employee wasn't able to do the task on time and he was so respectful with me saying ( I can do the task but just indulge me some additional time as I have the project from the other department needs to be submitted within the same period ).

Being me the manager I appreciate his words and how he was good enough with his manager and not saying NO in a direct way.

30l4l2013 Assertiveness

In today's class we leared what does assertiveness mean and the importance of this trait. Generally being assertive means saying the truth without being shy nor hurtful. We have seen the difference between being aggressive and being assertive by watching a video. Indeed in order to be successful in your life, you must not be aggressive.

Afterwards, we were doing some rehearsal in order to understand the different aspects and reactions of the other person. This day was my first day to do rehearsal infront of the public, and I think it went good.

25/4/2013 Presenting

In today's class I didn't come. However it mainly was about finishing last day's presentation in order to present it to the public. I did the main idea of the presentation and we finished it from the day before. However I wasn't able to go to class to present with my mates. The only change they did was changing the presenting mediia or the tool.

I think it was a good idea, so that they catch the attention of the people by amazing them with the new tool, as people get bored from seeing power point all the time.

24/4/2013 Proper presentations

As always starting with reviewing the minute of the day before, and one of the blogs.

Today, the professor presented a new concept, which is how to present properly. Our prof asked for answering certain questions, provided in the lesson, regarding our feelings when presenting infront of people.

I personally don't have many problems with that as long as I'am prepared for doing so. Most of the tips, that we discussed, I already know them as I used to present many times during my all years in the career.

Finally we got an activity to do, which is ( how to write an introduction and conclusion ) of a presentation without getting deep in the main concept of the theme. We left the rest of the work to the next day.

23//4/2013 Satisfying someone who does not want to talk to you

In today's session, after doing the normal work, we began to do a different kind of activities. This time the activity won't be written. Mainly the activity is about convincing someone ,that is angry with you, to talk to you and not to give you with his back.

Satisfactoriness shall be done by non-verbal communication, so all the process must be quite, just doing some kind of movements, that will force the huffy person to pay his attention to you.

I have done this practice with my mate, and afterwards I have written a short report about the whole story ( how it has begun and how we have done the play ).

16/4/2013 Being a profesor and student at the same time

In today's session, after doing the daily work, we reviewed a description of how to write an email of one of the students. We corrected the email and important mistakes, and we afterwards knew how to write an email in a proper and effective way.

According to the fact that we have known how to write a proper email, the professor requested a new activity in which we have to be the professor writing a statement to his students descriping the way of how to write an email, and to be the student to correct existing wrong emails.

In addition to all that, we had to write two more emails in the proper way, and with all that activity number 4 is complete.

15/4/2013 How to write an e-mail 2 ?

In today's class after doing the daily work which is reviewing last day's minute and one blog, we started to continue with the activity that we left the day before.

We have downloaded the program freemind map in order to creat a map , which describes the proper way of writing an effective e-mail. We got to change the couples, that we worked with in the previous activity.

11/4/2013 How to write a proper e-mail?

In today's lesson we began as everyday by seeing the secretary seated infront of us, and reviewing the minute of the day before, taking the attendence,etc.....

Afterwards, we started to change the form of some questions ( the ones to be asked to Pedro Duque ) in order not to make their answer such as ( YES/NO ). We have seen some of the questions and the professor requested to modify any Yes or No expected answer of any question you have in the list that each of us has prepared.

We have also discussed the second activity which it says, what does your profile photo communicate? We talked about when/where to have formal picture on the profile and when/where not to have.

Before the end of the lesson, the professor inroduced a new activity which is how to write a proper e-mail? we ended up the class at this point and to be continued in the next class with this activity.

10/4/2013 Preparing proper questions

As we mentioned in the previous lesson, On Friday, we are going to meet a famous Spanish astronaut and we got to prepare ourselves before meeting him. In today's class we actuallty prepared some accurate questions to be asked to him during the conference.

We randomly picked some questions which are done by the students and selected the most favourable ones. The selection process was based on voting ( if the question gets many votes we put it in the list ).

Moreover , each one of us had to communicate his profile picture in the university website, and to describe his photo in a single word ( which style does your photo look like? serious,careless, etc.... ).

9/4/2013 Who is Pedro Duque?

In this class we have known a famous person. This guy is Pedro Duque.

Pedro Duque is a spanish astronaut ( being the first and the only Spanish astronautic ) who used to do missions in the space. Pedro has worked in the ESA since many years ago.

We talked about him in the class and his background in preparation before meeting him on the upcoming Friday.After having a look at his profile and history we are now prepared to meet him and to communicate with him properly.

4/4/2013 School and creativity

In this class the main thing we have done is watching a video talking about how does school destroy the creativity of the students. Generally the guy in video said that there are some students that are very good  in certain subjects, but they are not in other subjects and therefore they are forced to repeat the whole year if they fail any subject that they don't like.

The main argument in the discussion was, why do students have to study things they don't  like? why do schools disappoint the students if they are already creative in a certain specialization? why do schools force students to study things that they do not want?

We disscussed this issue in the class.Moreover we did exchange ideas and different opinions. The majority of us agreed with the video, whereas few of us said that you have to have at least a little knowledge about everything, thus disagreed.

I personally agree with the video. Moreover the system that I used to study with in school was very comfortable. As of high school I only used to study engineering and not anything else not related with engineering, and that was somehow useful when I entered the university.

2\4\2013 Introduction to the course

In the first lesson we had an introduction to the subject presented by the professor. The introduction included many things such as the criteria that we are going to follow during the trimester, how the subject will be taught, and the evaluation process.

Mainly, what we have to do in each class is to write in the wiki created by the student everything you do regarding the subject, and the time taken from you in doing it, and to write in the blog which is created by the student as well the main things you do in the class ( being this as a daily task after each class ).

Secondly, in each class there will be a secretary helping the professor in organizing the class's agenda and attendence, etc....

Moreover, as it was the first class, each of us presented himself in order to know each other.

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