(wow i wrote this like one sem ago but i have not published it lololol)
I took 6 modules this semester:
I took 6 modules this semester:
LSM2103
LSM2191
GEH1049
GET1039
GES1016
FMS1212P
Even though I overloaded, it was manageable... but towards the end where submissions were all around the same week... I almost thought I couldn't do it wtf!! Imagine having 3 essays due all the same week. And you have a lab report due. And a presentation on something you have no idea about.
LSM2103
Cell Biology
About the module:
- Lectures twice a week
- No tutorials
- Many assignments (video, paper discussion, poster design, question design)
- Yes finals (open book)
Lectures were by 2 main lecturers, Prof Thilo and Prof Yeong. Prof Thilo loves teaching concepts by using research papers. Prof Yeong follows the more traditional, chronological order lectures that we are probably used to haha. I liked both methods, and they do attempt to keep lectures interesting by showing us videos etc, which I appreciate (as opposed to the lecturers cracking jokes every second).
Content wise, i would say it wasnt heavy because all you had to do were to understand concepts and apply them in the questions asked. So if you live your academic life by memorising everything... maybe it wont help as much in this module? I just remember frantically speed reading all lecture notes the day before ;__; and printing notes on the day of the exam (open book, but I didn't use the notes a lot tbh).
About the various assignments:
a) Video assignment (prof thilo): explain a concept via a 3 minute video. Video graded on how the common layperson understands the concept explained. Prof thilo actually emailed me!!!!!! And I got the highest mark in the module for this assignment WTF ;__; bittersweet b/c it was brandon who helped me with the video and i kept scolding him bc i was so stressed but he will never help me anymore so i guess its for the best
b) Research paper discussion (prof thilo): 2 discussions were held i think.
Basically you team up with 1 other person (you choose), register your teams and then prof thilo would merge 3 teams into 1 discussion group.
You read a research paper before hand and come to lecture to ask other teams questions/ answer questions/ evaluate other people's responses.
c) Poster design (prof yeong): Our task was to design a poster explaining how ER stress could lead to diabetes. The content on the poster should be easy to understand for the layperson, and this wasnt the biggest challenge imo; it is that all the images in the poster had to be original to get maximum marks!!!!! I SUCK AT DRAWING and wtf i gave up and decided to use a few stock images from google zzz
My poster didn't get good marks though, I think I got 6/10?
c) Designing MCQs (prof yeong): Make 2 questions on the lecture content and answer 20 questions made by your peers. Pretty easy I think.
d) Perusall research paper discussion (prof yeong): similar to prof thilo's paper discussion, but this time it is not a "live" discussion with your peers. You use this platform called perusall and you can highlight the content in the paper and add your own comments/ ask questions etc.
e) Mock CA: Not graded at all lol but its good to practice/ review the answers put out by the professors for finals
Finals: LSM2103 has a reputation for setting really hard questions for finals, but imo, if you understood all the lectures and the concepts behind western blot band widths, I think you wouldn't find it immensely challenging? Many people were whining after the paper but to me it was actually do-able HMMM
Grade obtained: A-
(I got a shock!!!! I always expect a B+ for all my mods lel so I get happy when expectations are exceeded. I think I got a good grade because of my video assignment? but still yey)
LSM2191
Laboratory techniques for life sciences
About the module:
- Lectures once a week
- No tutorials, but weekly lab sessions
- 2 main lab reports to do (4 expt = 1 lab report)
- 2 CAs
- NO finals!!
I love modules with no finals lol
ok anyways for this module, lectures were important for helping me understand concepts applied in the experiments. Lectures were also, obviously, important for scoring well in the 2 CAs lel. I had 2 lecturers for this mod, prof Nobert and prof Chung.
As like LSM2102, Prof Nobert's lecture notes were systematic (because he bases them off a textbook lol), and his lectures were quite fast paced because of the way he speaks. Prof Chung's lecture notes weren't bad too, and his lectures were okay. BUT HE COULDNT FIGURE OUT THE MIC SETTINGS, SO I COULDNT HEAR A SINGLE SHIT FOR HALF HIS LECTURES.... ;__;
For lab, you should pray everyday that you get a good TA hahaha. THANK GOODNESS my TA was awesome and explained everything we needed to know to do the lab reports!!!! He was also responsive to emails, which really helps when you have a question while doing the lab report lol. Mabel's #1 tip for me pertaining to this module is to start your lab reports early. After every experiment, just collate the information gathered during that session and start writing your introduction/ results section. Trust me you will not suffer lol Mabel didnt sleep at all writing the report before her deadline and I saw how stressed she was (ryan was more stressed through hahah)
Blast honestly isn't that hard to do... Like everyone whines that omg its so hard wtf is this blah blah blah but if you would just spend half a day fiddling with the software you will get it!!! At first I was so overwhelmed but i spent an entire day figuring shit out and it is honestly SO SATISFYING to finally get it.
TBH 2191 was my favourite module because.. I love writing lab reports lol wtf
I get "flow" when I do lab reports hahah but of course it is different for everyone!
CAs:
a) Prof nobert's CA is open universe with unlimited attempts I think? Good time to collab with your friends and discuss! Helping each other > doing it alone
b) Prof chung's CA was the traditional sit-in-MPSH-and-do kinda CA. Closed book. Quite hard????
Grade obtained: A-
(I think if only I did better for the second CA, I would have gotten A!! But its ok im satisfied haha)
GEH1049
Public health in action
About the module:
- 1h lecture + 1h group assignment + 1h evaluation (weekly)
- 3 individual essay assignments
- No finals, no CA
Lectures: Before the start of every lecture, at 10am on the dot (even if it rains, they still start at 10am lol) will be a short lecture quiz pertaining to the readings released on IVLE beforehand. The first few weeks I was like whut. where are the readings. so I googled DURING the quizzes lol bless me
Lecturers were different every week, so that kinda sucks when a lecturer is great, you'll be sad because he'll only teach us for a week lol. But they do that so each lecturer lectures on something they are specialised in, which is great!!
The last lecturer that did the topic on cigarettes sucked though zzz.
Group assignments: Groups are determined by the course coordinator, and you should get a mixture of people from different majors in a group! I was lucky to have cooperative and awesome groupmates that came to lecture every week (i've heard of people from other groups not showing up for the entirety of the module's group work lol)
Basically after lecture, everyone will be given questions to work on, which usually take on the form of case study/ policy planning questions, to be completed in 50 minutes. Then we will have to submit it on turnitin and return back to lecture.
I'd say it's pretty stressful to complete so much discussing/ typing in less than an hour!!! But the great thing about this mod is you'll just need to be stressed for an hour every week and then you're free lol
Evaluation: Here is where the lecturers try to get everyone to speak up and showcase whatever we've talked/ thought about the past hour. Participation marks are awarded to groups that speak up, but they will call on people who haven't contributed to anything yet lol
Individual essay assignments: 1 essay as 'mid term CA', 2 essays as 'finals' lol
I did one mark above average for the first essay, and idk my marks for the final two. But I think I should have done quite well, because of my final grade hehe
The essays mainly revolve around the Bronfenbrenner's ecological framework! It is important to understand this framework and apply it to answer the question/ structure your answer.
Grade obtained: A+
(unexpected! i was honestly rly stressed formulating how to approach the final 2 essay questions. I attended the lecture session where questions about the essay were made open and we could ask the markers what they are expecting from us. I guess that kinda helped? )
GET1039
What, where, when is art
What, where, when is art
Took this module because prof greg did a very comprehensive module outline, which made me want to challenge my learning in NUS LOL. Basically the module is seminar style, 1h twice weekly. We learnt about the different viewpoints of how people perceive and categorise art.
https://blog.nus.edu.sg/whatisart/
^ does a better job at me summarising what we learnt, so i'll just give you my personal exp and thoughts!!
Initially, I took this module because it had no final examinations. I was intrigued by the content that was going to be taught in the module, but I think we didnt finish whatever prof greg initially planned out, because discussions in class were always lengthy and an hour per session just wasn't enough. I guess the nature of the content we learnt were all pretty confusing to us (think, aristotle and goodman lol) and hence everyone had questions and the prof rly addressed each one thoroughly
Prof greg is one of those rare professors in NUS that seem to genuinely love what he's teaching!! :') I hope his family is okay, and that he can continue teaching this module.
The art review and art theory essays were quite difficult for me tbh, because I was still pretty lost about how to formulate content taught into my own thoughts, and structure them such that it was my personal art theory.
https://blog.nus.edu.sg/whatisart/
^ does a better job at me summarising what we learnt, so i'll just give you my personal exp and thoughts!!
Initially, I took this module because it had no final examinations. I was intrigued by the content that was going to be taught in the module, but I think we didnt finish whatever prof greg initially planned out, because discussions in class were always lengthy and an hour per session just wasn't enough. I guess the nature of the content we learnt were all pretty confusing to us (think, aristotle and goodman lol) and hence everyone had questions and the prof rly addressed each one thoroughly
Prof greg is one of those rare professors in NUS that seem to genuinely love what he's teaching!! :') I hope his family is okay, and that he can continue teaching this module.
The art review and art theory essays were quite difficult for me tbh, because I was still pretty lost about how to formulate content taught into my own thoughts, and structure them such that it was my personal art theory.
Overall, this is for sure going to be one of my favourite modules that I've taken in NUS :')
Grade obtained: A-
I guess i didnt do the art theory writing well LOL honestly the way I wrote it was too simplistic and didnt bring out the complexities of whatever we have learnt in the semester. I would like to take another mod by Prof Greg but i dont think he teaches any other mod that is non music/ non utown lol
GES1016
Contemporary social issues in Singapore
About the module:
- Lectures weekly
- Tutorials once every 2 weeks (either odd or even, depends on tutorial balloting results)
- No webcast (fml)
- 1 Group project
- 1 Individual reflection
- YES finals
ok the only reason why I took this module is because i assumed it was a sociology module, but its a social work mod lol. So my bad, and this is partially why I did so badly for this mod lol
This entire module is essentially a current affairs module, but with a social work perspective. And tbh I always thought social work was like just helping people (yes im ignorant), but it's more than that! It's analysis of the problems in society and putting yourself in the perspectives of multiple people. That being said, I didnt quite grasp what my tutor and lecturer were looking for in this module. I feel that the expectations for this module in terms of what to know, and what to write in finals wasn't clear. My final essay ended up being a round-a-bout mess.
Having said that... There was group project involved in this mod, and I was lucky to have social work group mates! Although that became more of a bane than boon because the tutor seemed to expect way higher of our presentation wtf and tbh i felt she was kinda unfair because she cut us off, when she didnt for other groups that were also over time :/ So... I think we didnt do so well for our group project haha
But doing fieldwork research by talking to various people like the older folks living in the neighbourhood, and also people in senior day care centres were an eye opener. I actually felt quite sad after the end of all the interviewing because there are so many people our there who really just BARELY get by, even with all the "govt subsidies". This lady I spoke to who lived in a rented one room flat said she is unable to get additional financial subsidies because her son earns $1.6k. I dont know how true that is, or if she has spoken to a social worker who can help... But i really sympathise with her and realise because of how GOOD policy sounds when ministers or the newspaper reports it, we dont stop to think if the people in our soc who truly need such help are really getting it (accessibility and information gap).
Ok im rambling way too far haha
But yes take this mod if youre curious about the way a social worker thinks, and if you like to analyse current issues!
Grade: B
FMS1212P
SYC: Simple Yet Complex
CS/CU module
Project work presentation
Book/ chapter review
Fuck me. When people said FMS is easy.. IM LIKE WHAT ARE U TALKING ABOUT. Literally the entire time I was in class taking this mod question marks were running through my head. This module is about chaos theory and every seminar the prof would show a video explaining chaos theory. The videos were really good, but maybe I'm too dumb LMAO because i was (and still am) confused. Well obviously I got a few parts but overall??? I was just super thankful that its a CSCU module lol.
I took FMS because I wanted to clear the irritating faculty requirement thing science students need to clear. And yes in case you're wondering... If you're not Y1, you can still bid for FMS! Although it's only open in round3. TBH the mods available in R3 are all the odd physics/ math mods that are not in demand. I think 80% of my classmates were from Y2 and above, and there were only a handful of Y1s? So the class dynamic was pretty imbalanced imo.
The prof was rly nice, and he really tried his best to simplify/ explain the concepts LOL so good effort on his part.
Project work... ok so you pick a topic by raising ur hand asap and yelling the topic u wanna do (lol)
My project was on cancer. If you're interested to view my presentation slides here is the google ppt link!
Overall.. I think it's an enjoyable mod with regards to the people and the prof. I'm just glad I got the chance to learn something new totally outside my major! I've always wanted to know more about chaos theory (and not just the media hyped version) and I guess this mod was great in supplementing more technical information.
Grade obtained: CS
OK DONE!! BYE!! Hope this helped lol every sem i try to write something concise but veer way off
