PROJECT 1 - EXPERIENCING, DOCUMENTING & APPRECIATING NATURE
INTRODUCTION
The main idea of this project is for the students to experience, observe and appreciate nature. Part A of this project, individually, we will have to present our experiences in a photo journal scrapbook. On the other hand, part B of this project is about creating Taman Negara infographic pop-up awareness poster in a group of four or five.
PART A - PHOTO SCRAPBOOK JOURNAL
INTRODUCTION
This individual Photo Scrapbook Journal should show personal experiences and thought, attach photographs, information and also information of elements that I personally investigated. It comprises of my own observation through 5 senses about Taman Negara, photographs of interesting scenery, natural environment and elements and more.
THE PROCESS
I went to a site visit to Taman Negara with my lecturers, Ms Delliya Zain, Ms Iffa Mohd Nayan and Mr Paul Nickson Atia together with my fellow course mates. The 3 days 2 nights trip aim to expose students to experience nature with their five senses and be sensitive to the organisms in nature and surrounding.
Taman Negara which located at Pahang was declared for conservation in 1938 and is a well-known sanctuary to hundreds of species of birds, butterflies, insects, fish and plants.
It was really a very fun experience as I enjoyed the fresh air, sound of nature and more during the visit. By being so close to the nature, we got amazed by the creatures of Mother Earth. The trip opened up our eyes and let most of us the urban kid to immerse in the atmosphere of nature.
We have to record the activities that we have done in Taman Negara in our photo scrapbook journal. Hence, we took many photos and make some journal notes along the trip.
- Day 1 -
We departed from campus at 7 am and reached Taman Negara at about 12 pm. After having lunch at the floating restaurant, we went to the orang asli settlement. We learned from Orang Batek their willingness to learn from others which make their survival in the nature easier.
The rapid shooting activities was the activity that everyone await. It was fun and adrenaline-pumping. We went for the night jungle walk although it was drizzling on that day. However, it did not make us cancelled this activity but we put up our raincoats and went for the night jungle walk and it proved to be worthy as we saw some insects, snake, scorpion and more during the walk.
- Day 2 -
We went for jungle trekking and the canopy walk. The boat ride to Latah Berkoh. We also made our miniature shelter at there. The Pokemon Night is a small competition held between three groups - Team Mystic, Team Instinct and Team Valor. We had our great time here as we get to know each other better through the activities like singing, and playing with the water balloon and more.
- Day 3 -
Most of us got food poisoning due to the dinner prepared at the floating restaurant we ate a day before. Our lecturers took us to the nearest clinic for treatments. At 1 pm, we departed from Taman Negara and went back home.
Our jungle trekking guide
Coursemate trying the sumpit shooting
My miniature shelter
The boat ride
My Photo Scrapbook Journal
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PART B - THE TAMAN NEGARA AWARENESS POP UP POSTER
From this trip, I learnt to appreciate what nature gives us. The understanding to nature also become deeper. From the amazement to the 20 storey tall tualang tree to the appreciation of the small walking stick in maintaining the ecosystem, I really got a lot of precious memories and knowledge that we could not find with just studying in the classroom. We always failed to be more observant about the hidden nature beauty.
On the other hand, I felt happy that the relationship between coursemates get closer through the activities organized. We helped each other in collecting information and shared with each other. During the trip, as most of us get food poisoning, those who were feeling well will help those who were sick to get treatment and take good care of them during the trip to go back to our campus. Our team spirit was built and formed through this field trip. I hoped that our course will have more trips like this.
INTRODUCTION
Students are required to produce 4 -5 boards of pop up infographic poster. The poster topic should be based on the random topic that given by our lecturers. The aim of the posters is to create public awareness and appreciation about nature and the environment in Taman Negara
THE PROCESS
Our team members are Cheok Kah Ying, Tiong Kai Yen, Kimberly Polo, Ng Bee Yee and me. Group members for each group were picked randomly by our lecturers. Although we were not familiar with each other, but through this project, our understanding to each others actually become better.
The first task to do in this project was to collect as much information about strangling fig-our topic. First, we encountered some problems in doing the research as we could not find much information regarding this plant. But after doing more and more deeper research, finally we found out some important points about this strangling fig such as the fig wasps, the ecological importance of this species.
It also changed our perception to never judge a book by its cover. One of the facts that awestruck us the most was the replanting of strangling fig is actually carrying out currently at Borneo to save the endangered species as strangling fig fruits all times throughout the year.
Our group decided to use PowerPoint to do the design layout and the visuals we chose to draw manually. A day before the presentation, we printed out the posters on foam boards. My groupmates helped in doing out the pop up things and I was incharged to draw the visuals such as the fig fruits, fig wasps and more.
THE PRESENTATION DAY
We were given 3 minutes to present our awareness infographic pop up poster. There were a few seniors invited to view and give us some comments regarding our posters together with our lecturers. Bee Yee and Kah Ying held a 3-minute long speech to them.
Our group photo with our tutor, Ms Iffa
Our Awareness Infographic Pop Up Poster
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Through this project, I learnt to observe the beauty of the nature from a different perspective. My appreciation towards the mother nature increases as we were exposed to the importance of the roles of every organisms in maintaining the ecosystem. The topic which was given to us for our infographic pop-up poster - strangling fig in our initial perception was a bad tree which kill the host tree for its own survival. However, after done some researches, we started to know the importance of this species which help the survival of endangered frugivore species.
As infographic is a new term for us, our lecturers made many efforts to give us a concept and ideas on this topic by posting many examples that they derived from Internet. Through many trial and errors during the tutorial sessions, we finally came out with five infographic posters that we are satisfied with as we can see our improvements in understanding and applying infographic elements into our poster.
As we were doing the posters digitally, we faced some difficulties in the beginning in designing the posters as everyone's poster will turn out to be different. After discussing with my group mates we decided to delegate the tasks according to our strengths. Bee Yee and Kimberly were in charged of doing research and search for information about strangling fig while Kah Ying, Kai Yen and me were assigned to do the poster layout. These had ease and make our project to be finished on time.We discussed and make our first poster layout design together before we proceeded to make another two poster layout by our own. The delegation of task is very important.