THIVASHINI A/P SELVENTHIRAN (MIC190051)

GIG1005 SOCIAL ENGAGEMENT

REFLECTIVE WRITING

Introduction to Microbiology 

THIVASHINI A/P SELVENTHIRAN (MIC190051)                              Date: 30th April 2020

When I first came to know about this social engagement course, I was surprised about how different it is from the other university courses. Dr Puah, our instructor had given a short briefing about the course during our last semester. At first, I thought that social engagement is merely about our capability to socialize with students. Day by day, I realize the process in achieving the goal was very important and it taught me a lot of things. In addition of socializing, I also learned the significance of a team work and taught myself skills such as creating questionnaire. In the end, I was very happy that I able to disseminate information to the secondary school students.

During our semester break, we divided ourselves into groups and each group were assigned to a secondary school. We were given our first task to create power point slides about the “The Secret Life of DNA”. Works were segregated through online and we were able to complete the first task successfully with our instructor’s guidance. 

On 13th March, we had our first internal workshop to get briefing about the activities that going to be conducted in SMK Sri Pantai. First of all, we made a foldscope referring to a tutorial video and it was fun since it brings me back to my school memories for a moment. The foldscope was used to view the microbes slides. From this activity, the students are able to get introduced to the world of microbiology. Moving on, we learned shapes of bacterias using balloon and it gave me a new perspective in learning the shapes. I found this method very effective as we used the inflated colorful balloon to make shapes of bacterias such as cocci and bacilli. 

After that, we conducted an activity to find how far the particles transmitted when we sneeze. We used a spraying bottle to eject the blue liquid and measured the distance of particles transmitted on a mahjong paper. I was amazed about how far the particles can be travelled and also how dangerous it could be. Finally, we did an activity called ‘Handshake effect’. We observe our hands under UV light with some powder on. It’s was surprising for me when the powder didn’t go away even after washing my hand in my normal way. I realized mistake that I was applying the wrong method in washing my hands. These activities taught me well and hoped it would do the same to the secondary school we bound to visit.

Unfortunately, due to the Covid-19 outbreak we were now under the movement control order. We supposed to cancel all of our activities and changed it into E-learning mode. I was too sad that I unable to meet the students in SMK Sri Pantai as we didn’t get the chance of being interacted and socialize with the students. It was really disappointing but our instructor had managed to come with an alternative method in feeding information to them. We were required to do some new tasks in order to deliver the messages via online platform. Works were divided among our group members and I was in the team of preparing a questionnaire to assess knowledge attitude and handwashing among Biomedical science students from Year 1 to Year 4. It was interpreted that most of the respondents have high knowledge level of hand hygiene.

Our group members also given task to produce two infographic posters about ‘Covid-19' and ‘How to wash your hand in effective ways’. We able to produce the posters sufficient information in a colorful manner. We also created a video about proper handwashing method which was very useful to us as well. We received too many inputs in the process of making these tasks. The posters and video were then posted in a blog where the students of SMK Sri Pantai can get accessed to. Even though we were not able to engage with them face to face, I am really glad that the messages can be delivered to them through the blog.

With increasing number of Coivd-19 cases, I really hoped that our work had contributed enough to create awareness to the community. Health is our biggest priority and safety measures plus precautions must be taken to curb this disease. During this period of time, I had learned proper way to wash my hand and feed myself with information regarding corona virus. We had too many barriers in making this happen. Despite all that, I’m proud of my team because of their cooperation in using this online platform. I am really grateful for being part of this whole process. I am thankful to my instructor for giving me the guidance and being such an eye-opener. Social engagement is a very exciting course and of course it became my favorite as well. 

      (818 words)