Day 10 - Library Service

Today was a special lecture conducted by librarians Ms. Ramani and Ms. Wathsala about library services. The objective of this lecture was to encourage students to use library more that includes various types of resources. Following are some information resources available in the library,

• Books
• Journals
• Newspapers
• Market research reports
• Statistics
• Patents
• Internet
• Conference papers
• Research reports and theses

There are many more services like Athens which gives wide range of information from outside resources. Apiit library allows students to access this information easily. Furthermore it also connects other libarary information portals which allow wider access to information for Apiit students. After that session was concluded

Reflection of today's lecture

This was an excellent and useful session for me personally because I was stuck middle of my E-commerce project research due to lack of information. After today’s lecture I logged into Athens account and searched various portals such as Nexis and Emerald to find information regarding my research company, Monster.com. As result I was able to find various important articles which are very useful. So I thought today session gave us something new about apiit library service and it was indeed very useful.  

Day 9 - Personality

Today topic was about “Personality”. Mr Eranjan started today lecture in a different way. He conducted a personality test which included several questions for student. Following are the questions,

The questions were simple and straightforward. Students answered those questions simply and for some it was confused. Objective of this personality test was to,

• Test whether you tend to do simple things in an overly complicated way.  
• Test your ability to think through the repercussions of your actions.
• Test your memory.
• Test whether you learn from your mistakes.

After the personality test, Mr Eranjan talked about some important facts regarding personality. Following are some critical points discussed during today’s lecture.

What is personality?

According to Oxford Dictionary (2012) personality is the “combination of characteristics or qualities that form an individual’s distinctive.” 

John Henry Holland which is an American scientist and Professor of Psychology, has categorized personality into 6 types,

1. Realistic - Prefers physical activities that require skill, strength, and coordination. 
2. Artistic - Likes to do creative activities like art, drama, crafts, dance, music, or creative writing.
3. Social - Likes to do things to help people -- like, teaching, nursing, or giving first aid, providing information.
4. Enterprising - Likes to lead and persuade people, and to sell things and ideas.
5. Conventional - Likes to work with numbers, records, or machines in a set, orderly way.
6. Investigative - Likes to study and solve math or science problems; generally avoids leading, selling, or persuading people.

After discussing above points, there was a small group activity. Each group consist of four members were given a scenario and one member has to observe one other group and find answers for list of questions.  After the group activity session was concluded.

Reflection of today's lecture

Today I learned some important facts regarding personality. Main thing I learned from today’s lecture was that personality is something that unique to a person. It’s different from person to person. According to John Holland’s six personality theory, I felt that I belong to social category. With the group activities, sessions are getting more fun and entertaining day by day. With today’s lecture I was able to understand what personality means in theoretical way, which could help me in the future career. Overall it was an important and interesting session. 

 

References

Oxford Dictionary. 2012. Definition of personality. [ONLINE] Available at:http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/personality. [Accessed 26 July 12]. 

Day 8 - Ethics and Code of Conduct Continue...

Today lecture was a continuation from previous lecture; Ethics and Code of Conduct. Today beginning of the lecture, Mr Eranjan discussed about five steps of ethical analysis. They are as follows,

Step 1 - Identify stakeholders involve in ethical issue and the facts pertaining to the issue.

Step 2 - Define the conflict or dilemma and identify the higher order values involved

Step 3 - Identify the stakeholders and see the impact.

Step 4 - Identify the actions you can take which are reasonable.

Step 5 - identify the potential consequences of your options.

Then Mr Eranjan started on a new topic which was business ethics. Following are some important topics discussed regarding business ethics.

What is business ethics?

Business ethics is the study of business situations, activities, and decisions where issues of right and wrong are addressed. 

Characteristics of business ethics

1.      Tells people what they ought to do.

2.      Set of principles or rules.

Concepts of Ethics

There are four concepts of ethics,

1.      Relativism - no universal standard by which morality can be judged since ethics change from country to country.

2.      Egoism - one ought to act in his or her own self-interest.

3.      Utilitarianism - the morality of an action can be determined by its consequences.

4.      Deontologism - actions are not justified by their consequences. Factors other than good outcomes determine the rightness of actions

Before concluding the session, Mr Eranjan quickly went through the final topic which was ethical tests. This topics includes following,

·        Legal Test

·        Benefit Cost Test

·        Light of Day Test

·        Do Unto Others Test

·        Ventilation Test    

Legal test

Reflection of today's lecture

Today was an interesting lecture. I had never learnt about business ethics before and this session just provided me rich information about the topic. Business ethics will be more useful when we enter business environment because it can help us as employees to engage in ethical operations. Overall today session was interesting and I believe that this information might help me some day in my life.   

Day 7 - Ethics and Code of Conduct

Today I was unable to attend lectures due to personal matter. But today topic was about ethics and code of conduct. As my classmates told me, following are important points discussed during today’s lecture.

 

What does ethics means?

Basically ethics means to do what is right and wrong, based on morality.

Mr Eranjan has explained that ethics have been developed from generations to generations and morale value of it has changed from county to country, culture to culture and society to society. 

Composition of ethics

Ethics are composite of two elements; religion and law. These two elements are important in forming the ethics of a person.

Following are some examples for ethics that Mr Eranjan have discussed during today’s lecture,

·Sending parents to elders home is unethical in Sri Lanka culture however it is a different case in some other western countries like USA.

·Public affection is accepted in European countries but in Asian countries it can be unethical.

Finally, Mr Eranjan have discussed about basic concepts of ethics. They are as follows,

·        Responsibility 

·        Accountability   

·        Liability   

To conclude the session, Mr Ernajan has given a group activity which was to act out an ethical situation happening at APIIT.

A scene performed by Cindy, Shavindra and Sumedha about discrimination of dress code between the boys and girls at APIIT (Captured by: Thasneema Hamza)

Reflection of today's lecture

Today I was unable to attend lectures, but what I heard from classmates is that, today lecture was important and at the same time it was an entertaining session. Ethics are guidelines that show us what is wrong and right. And those guidelines also help us to take correct decision. Also today lecture emphasize how important ethics to our day today life. 

 

    

Day 6 - Brain Activity

At the start of the lecture, Mr Eranjan checked our time log and energy cycle. Following pictures shows my personal time log and energy cycle,

Time Log

Energy Cycle

After that Mr Eranjan explained us how to prioritise our time. He also explained that, as students we should prioritise our time according to following criteria,

• Spend 75% on the things you MUST do.
• Spend 20% on the things you SHOULD do.
• Spend 5% on the things you LIKE to do.

After that lecture told us to compare our time log activities with above criteria. In this way you can find whether your time is managed properly to do must, should and like activities.

Then Mr Eranjan discussed us about the Pareto Principle, which states that "20% effort produces 80% effect". Furthermore, Mr Eranjan discussed about different time wasters. Some are as follows,

Self-generated	Environmental
Disorganisation Procrastination Inability to say “No” Lack of Interest Unnecessary perfectionism Burn-out	Visitors Telephone calls / e-mail Junk mail Waiting for someone Unproductive meetings Crises

There are many ways to stop time wasting. Some ways are,

• Sort out your priorities.
• Plan using to do lists, optimise use of your peak energy times.
• Be more assertive – learn to say ‘No’.
• Handle each piece of paper only once.
• Decide how you will deal with interruptions.
• Don’t delay – do it now!.
• Be conscious of wasting other people’s time.
• Stand up when people come to see you
• Can you really afford time to read junk mail?
• Start and finish one job at a time.
• Delegate three things you really enjoy doing.

After that Mr Eranjan concluded the session for today. But he gave us an exercise to evaluate our brain functions which measures which type of person you are. For that we used small software called "brain" where everyone has to answer at least 20 questions. After that software shows our brain usage profile. 

According to my brain usage profile 

Day 5 - SMART Goals

Start of the lecture Mr Eranjan asked each one of their short term and long term goals. There was interesting goals from different class members and few of my goals were,

• Complete the degree with a good class.
• Save up money.
• Find a good job.

After listening to our goals, Mr Eranjan told that our goals should be always SMART. In this case SMART stands for,

• S- Specific (states exactly what will be accomplished)
• M-Measurable (milestone events and dates)
• A-Actionable (set up things to be done)
• R-Realistic (goal can be achieved within geographic and other constraints)
• T-Timely (time allowed is reasonable but not too long)  

Then Mr Eranjan explained that achieving short, medium and long term goals should result in achieving life time goal, which is top level goal in someone’s life. 

Goals can be categorized in many ways such as, 

• Artistic goals.
• Attitude goals.
• Career goals.
• Knowledge goals.
• Family goals.
• Educational goals.
• Financial objectives.
• Physical objectives.
• Pleasure goals.
• Public service goals.

After explaining different types of categories, Mr Eranjan gave us our assignment for this module. He briefly discussed about the outcome of the assignment. Then session was concluded. 

Reflection of today's lecture     

Today lecture helped me lot to identify my short, medium and long term goals. It's really important to have goals in your life. When you have a goals, you keep intend to work until it's achieved. This lesson definitely taught me few lessons about time management and goals. I felt it was an important and effective session for all of us.    

I also found a interesting video in you-tube which describes SMART goals and productivity, Enjoy..

                                                                    

                      

Day 4 - Time Management

Mr Eranjan started today lecture with checking homework which he gave us on previous day. Our group presented the mind map in front of class and received a good reception for it. Then he started today main topic - Time Management.

First of all Mr Eranjan explained us why time management is so important to people in our age. He also explained that according to Peter Drucker's theory "Time is totally inelastic, perishable and cannot be replaced". And he also explained that if we manage time during the day effectively to do our work, we will have productive and positive result at the end of the day.

According to Mr Eranjan's explanations, there are many ways you can manage your time. As a first step he told us to create a time log which includes all the activities, time spent for an activity, objective of the activity and interruptions. 

Structure of the time log

As the second step Mr Eranjan advised us to create an energy cycle which shows average energy of a person throughout the day. By that, one can identify when the energy level is high or low. Following picture shows a sample energy cycle,

Sample Energy Cycle

As the second step Mr Eranjan advised us to create an energy cycle which shows average energy of a person throughout the day. By that, one can identify when the energy level is high or low. Following picture shows a sample energy cycle,

For homework Mr Eranjan told us to maintain a time log for next day and produce an energy cycle for it. Apart from that Mr Eranjan also gave us few tips on time management. They are,

•Tackle the most difficult tasks early in the morning.

•Use to do lists, diaries, wall planners, and electronic organizers.

•Give priority to matters which are urgent rather than those which are important.

•Prioritise tasks and work in that order.

•Tackle tasks one at a time, or multi-task.

•Accept no unscheduled interruptions.

•Delegate where possible.

•Work in a place where you will not be disturbed.

   

Finally Mr Eranjan advised us to identify few long term and short goals and write them down. After that session was concluded.

Reflection of today's lecture

Most important lesson that i learnt from today's lecture is that, time is very important. It's important because no one can regain it. Another important thing i learned is time management. Some tips that Mr Eranjan gave today helped me lot to understand time management. Recently i was unable to manage time proper way, but i understood that it's time to manage time again in proper way using proper methods because it will be useful to balance everything in life. I hope to manage my time in effective way so i could have a productive outcome in the future.

I also found an excellent book on time management in Mr Eranjan's folder called Beyond Time Management, Business with Purpose. I am looking forward to read this book and learn some new ways of managing time. 

Day 3 - Mind Maps

Today topic was about "Mind Maps". As Mr Eranjan explained, mind map is an effective tool and a way to summarize, remember and recall information from your brain. Mind maps are so creative and colourful that it help someone to remember information rather than in text format.

There are some more ways that mind map can be helpful, like

• Think through complex problems.

• Organize information in proper way.
• Support for studying.
• Combine information from different sources.
• Convert list of dull information into graphical and colourful symbols, words and images.

 Following picture shows an example for mind map in subject of energy saving,

Mind map for energy saving tips for a school

After brief explanation about "Mind Maps", Mr Eranjan explained three types of learning methods in people. They are as follows,

1. Visual Learners - People who learn new things and skills best through visuals.

2. Auditory Learners - People who learn thing best from listening and verbal communication.

3. Kinesthetic Learners - People who learn things best from doing it by practically or experiences.

Three types of learning methods

In the conclusion of the session Mr Eranjan gave us a group activity to draw a mind map for any subjects as home work. After that session was concluded.

Reflection of today's lecture

Today lecture helped me a lot to understand which type of person i am in learning. I felt that i am more a visual person because when learning or studying most of the time i use diagrams and colourful themes to remember something. This whole lecture reminds me how i worked in Advanced Level classes where i tried best to visual things rather than keep it in text format. There are so many mind maps we can find in internet and there are also lot of professional sites such as mindtools.com, mindmapping.com and we-mindmap.com to read more about mind maps. Overall today lecture was an effective one for all students.  

  

  

Day 2 - Everybody Loves Group Activities

Today lecture started with making groups for group activities that will be regular throughout the module. Mr Eranjan formed groups by randomly dividing the class members to five main groups. One group consisted with 5-6 members and my group had 6 members including myself. The group members are,

Cindy, Adil, Janith, Charith, Selaka and myself

After groups were formed, our first assignment was to come up with a name for the group and design a group flag that represent six members. After a brief discussion with the group members we named our group " Kaboom". Then our group flag was designed with help of everyone. Following pictures shows the group flag designed by the group members

Group Flag

In the flag, first letter of each group member's name is used to represent the each member. And all the lines that combine in middle symbolize unity of the group. In the middle of the flag a star is located to represent the feeling of achievement where all the members will shine as stars for their achievements. 

Next we introduced our own group members in front of the other class members. One has to introduce another member and i introduced Selaka. We introduced group members using their name, age, school, personal interests and idols. 

After these activities the session was concluded by the lecturer and reminded us about the next lecture that is "mind map". 

Reflection of today's lecture

For past few semesters we had theory modules such as ISOM and MPP which was rather boring subjects, where we have to do most of the work by ourselves. Even assignments were individual. Today after lectures i felt really comfortable and less boring because of group activities that always fun than normal lectures. Mr Eranjan said we will be doing so much group activities throughout the module, which made me, satisfied that this module not going to be a boring one. Apart from that i learnt how we should accomplish some task as a group. Coordination between group members is always important. I hope our group can accomplish every task that will come our way for next few weeks. As always Mr Eranjan gave us effective facts about how to work as a group.   

God bless everyone!!  

Day 1 - Introduction

Today is the first lecture of ARMPD which is Applied Research Methods and Professional Development. Lecturer for this module is Mr Eranjan Padumadasa, who was with us for past two semesters. 

Beginning of the lecture Mr Eranjan gave a brief introduction to the module which includes learning objectives, learning outcomes and module structure etc.. Mainly ARMPD consist with two major components. One component is Applied research methods, whereas students it can be useful to study and research about a certain problem and find a practical solution for it. As 2nd Year students this is very useful to our final year project. Other component is Professional development, where you can learn how to obtain skills and knowledge for a professional career. 

In this session Mr Eranjan explained us three important skills that one must develop for a good career. There are as follows

1.  Cognitive Skills - Ability to learn things from experience, day today activities and the senses. Using cognitive skills you will be able to understand new information, evaluate them and synthesis with things that you already know. 

2.    Affective Skills - Skills like time management, punctuality and attention to detail. 

3.  Motor Skills - A set of skills or functions that help you to master a particular task precisely and effectively.

After brief discussion about the topic, students were advised to maintain a blog to write day today activities in ARMPD lectures. 

Reflections

I think this module gives a good platform to a professional career. And it is also very useful to our final year project. As i have few months left in Apiit life, it is really important to look forward for a good profession. I believe thing that i will learn from this module will help me to achieve my utmost goal, have a good profession.  

God bless everyone!!