i want to share a knowledge that i get from listening workshop that provide by my tuition class.I learnt about listening skills. Listening is important to prove that the students are paying attention and encourage concentration in class so that they will be able to make questions if there is a certain part of the lesson that they do not understand. Selective listening is different from active listening because listener can choose or pick what they want to listen. Together with listening skill, the lecturer taught about the connection between listening and note taking skills. If a student wants to be an active listener, one must practice note taking. When one listens to something and practicing note taking simultaneously, he will become more alert with the lesson learnt. I am poor in listening skill. I could not even remember the things that the lecturer has told me in the class once I reached home. Because of that, I always tend to forget about assignments and tasks that has been given by lecturer and to overcome this problem, I jot down everything especially the date and the details about my assignments. I even wrote those things on a stick-it-note and paste it at my closet to make sure that I am not missing anything important. My friends and I who are poor in listening skill tried our best to attend class early so that we can go sit in front. I also tried to watch English movies without subtitles to make sure that I concentrate and listen to what the dialogues say as well as improve my listening skill. On Wednesday, in the same week, a workshop has been held to expose to students about how to search or find information using databases. Through this workshop, we have clear information on how we can find academic information that we are going to use in our assignments, researches and theses.

      In this class, I studied about summary and paraphrase. Summary is shortening or decreasing 50% or less word from original article. The purpose is to simplify the original and make it easier to digest. I have to think of the receiver of my summary as someone who does not understand the subject matter very well. By practicing this, one is more likely to do an effective job as well as save my time to identify the main idea of the topic. The basic steps to summarize are read the original document, fully understand what the topic is all about, combine two or three sentences into one, and check my work whether the main point is there and if I have missed any important parts. Paraphrase is giving the meaning in another form which required me to restate and reword. Summary and paraphrase is twin. They are not identical but always come together. So the definition of summary and paraphrase is shortening the original document in my own words. The next one is synthesizing which is one level up than the other two. Synthesize is accumulating information from various sources that are needed when I finish doing research for a term paper or thesis. Class then proceeded to the right ways to do citation and quotation. The difference between these two are citation required writer to rephrase author’s original words but maintain the meaning while quotation enable writer to take the exact words from original author without any changes. I also learnt that there are actually two types of quotation that are short quotation and long quotation and the correct way to use both of them. The lecturer gave an exercise on how to summarize and taught us about which words can be taken out and which words are not. I was not aware that when I was trying to rephrase the words to make it shorter, I was actually changing its original meaning. I am now fully aware that I cannot simply rephrase any words without checking them first. Reference list that is used by universities in Malaysia follow APA (American Psychological Association) format. There are different formats for each sources including book, journal, online website and others. I also learnt about format used for cover pages and it is actually can reflect someone’s professionalism. 

 READING SKILL

In this  week, I want to share with you about reading skill. i want to share with you how to read effectively. First of all, students had to do some self evaluations. We had to ask ourselves whether we are a smart reader or not? Do we know and apply any strategies to be smart readers? we learnt ways to improve reading comprehension. There are active reading strategies, start with something general, guide my reading, reread difficult passages, highlight keywords and others. we have been told that we can apply the C.R.E.A.M learning strategies that we have learnt in the first week of class to improve our reading skill. When I am in any tests that reading skill is required, I always use a lot of time and that always make my time management mess up and sometimes I cannot finish my test on time. To avoid this problem from repeating again, I have to practice speed reading. we have some ways to improve reading speed. Some of the ways are finger tracking, know when to read aloud as well as keep my eyes moving forward. But in some situations, slow reading might be helpful. I am that kind of person who cannot concentrate on my reading when I am in busy or noisy environment. I have to reread the passages all over again and because of that, I take more time that is needed. To overcome this problem, I tried to read articles in newspaper or magazines and asked my friend to set the time for me when I was in public places. I practiced the finger tracking and highlight keywords strategies, and fortunately I managed to solve my problem and finish the reading on time.

note taking skill

Note taking is providing systematic formal for condensing and organizing notes without recopying. We must take note to get a point, to understand the lesson and to remember better. sometimes, the instructor share information not available in text book and note taking help the students become active learner ,critical thinker and also effective learner because we will more focus on what the lecturer said, what we are read and force to think rapidly about what we see and hear.

          There are several systems of note taking including Connell, outline, mapping, sentence, charting and Harvard. I like to use mapping and sentence system depends on the course. If I am going to write an essay, I tend to use sentence system since it is the easiest and the fastest way to jot down the elaborations, examples and other things before I forget. When I am in class, I am able to listen to the lecturers and take notes at the same time and I use my own words in my note taking so that I can understand everything that I wrote in class when I want to reread them up at home. This is also to ensure that I still can understand the notes that I have taken in my classes even after a few weeks. I am not that kind of student who can pay full attention in class since I will feel sleepy and to avoid being sleepy, I take notes. I like using mapping system too since it is much easier for me to add on more information regarding that particular topic when I know it somewhere else. I just have to draw another branch and write the new information that I have obtain. we must prepare to take note with review the course syllabus. Therefore, we will know what lecture talking about. the best systems of taking and making  note is Connell system because it has everything in this notes, we take the note in class and summarize and do the question or everything that relate with that topic in the Connell system

             The difference between note taking and note making are note taking is practiced during the class and note making is after the class. I start making notes within 24 hours after class because I am still remembering the things that the lecturer spoke in class. I always look up for more information through websites and books to make sure that my notes are excellent and can be used to revise when I want to study for tests or final exams.

How to find sources material for your assignment

             nowadays,we have a many sources to get information.most the familiar sources is internet,especially for communicating with your friend through facebook, emel, twitter,whatsap and others but for the academic purpose,we need to ensure that information found in the internet is reliable or not.

             the reliable sources that we can obtain from internet are e-journal,search engine,group discussion forums,online database journal,periodical,theses and dissertation and book.For the e-journal,we can locate e-journal from two place that are our university library and the internet.we can find the topic that we interested in.e-journal also provide free online,such as TESL-J that can share the latest information in specific field.

        besides,In group discussion forums,student can find out the latest development of the topic and we will get feedback and suggestion on how and where to find more information on your subject matter.online database journal also are useful to student of social science for example academic search premier,emerald management extra.

       for periodical,the student can get information from the published writing of people who want to share their newfound knowledge.these periodicals are usually in PDF form.in that,we can information from journal,specialsed magazines ,newspapers and magazine.

       book is largest or most famous sources of information in education.in book,the author share their knowledge in their field of specialisation.we can learn just by reading whether academic or non-academic books

           

ACADEMIC WRITING

         Whether you’re a student, teacher, or entrepreneur, academic writing skills are necessary in today’s world. Essays, reports, presentations and research papers are just some examples of documents written in the academic style.

         Information that we get from different sources that we use must credible, reliable, relevant and useful to the writing of our paper. we have three level in classification of information which are single-fact information, general information and in depth information

         Today, in my class, I learn how to determine either the sources good or not. Firstly,we must look URL address. for example, gov for government, edu for education, org for organization. From the URL, we can know the type of sources that we use.

        Secondly, we must look the content. we must see whether has author or not, this author expert or not.we also must look intended audience. It is important to remember who you are writing for. Being conscious of academic tone suggests that you are aware of your audience and respect the formality normally associated with academic writing. we are also must look references, valid or not.

Last but not least,we must check their currency of the sources. for example,the date of article,when they was return,when they was updated and that are copyright which determine who may publish, copy piece of writing,music or image from other person work.

 Plagiarism

Today's class,i learn about plagiarism.Plagiarism is critical issue among student in 
university.plagiarism is the take or steal of other people's written work.it is illegal and can be punish.nowadays,software program which is turnitin is has been used in university. this software can detect plagiarized work.

there are some categories of plagiarism which are copy and paste,paraphrasing too closely,translation without appropriate acknowledgement,buying papers,outsourcing,recycling your own paper,collusion(group discussion share idea but write by ourself), fabrication data(change data to make a perfect graph,data and others) and doctoring

there have a some strategies to avoid plagiarism which are by have well organize time of doing assignment,we must ready to draw up own writing framework before start doing assignment,just select the important information,must document all the sources ,create proper references, and see and ask the lecturer about the information and don't just copy it.