Koh Su En's Reflections

(I) Plenary Sessions [Day 1]

(A) My key learning points from each session...
1. Importance of Water - Dirty and Clean
Water is important and polluted water causes many diseases that will eventually harm man kind.

2. Revolution of Microelectronics Technology
Electronics affect future technology.

3. Biomedical Engineering & Technology
NanoTechnology affects life and many jobs.

4. IT for Animation by Prof Seah Hock Soon
Technology aims to make life easier.

5. Disappearing glaciers, rising sea levels, and why gravity is even more important than you think
Distribution of water is not equal throughout the world.

(B) Deepest impression...
The plenary session that leaves the deepest impression on me is IT for animation.
What I like about it is that the speaker is interesting and have many videos.

(II) My Personal Reflection [Day 2 & 3]

1. I choose this project because...
I thought that it would be interesting to extract caffeine from beverages, and wanted to know the process of doing so. It seems fun and able to apply to real life context about amount of caffeine in different types of beverages.

2. My role in the group...
was carrying out the experiment and taking pictures and videos, as well as helping in the cleaning up.

3. Challenges I/we encounter when working on this project in the last 2 days... and how I/we overcome these challenges...
It was quite hard to do some of the steps and was quite nervous as it can be explosive and we're handling dangerous chemicals. We double-confirmed the way to do it with each other and the student leaders, then slowly and carefully carry out the step. If we're really not confident in ourselves, let our partner try.

4. Through this project, I/we discover...
that extraction of caffeine is not an easy job. This is only one way of extracting caffeine and the caffeine cannot be consumed.

5. As an individual, how I have benefited from this programme...
I learnt about many things like atmospheric pressure (which is 1 bar), that I might not have learnt in the future if I did not take up chemistry. Discover a new side of chemistry that is fun and interesting, and had fun with dry ice and liquid nitrogen.

6. My Aspirations...
to learn more about dry ice and liquid nitrogen, as well as the process that they go through to make it that way. And how caffeine affects the body and how would coffee / tea taste like without caffeine.