Week 6 - Preparation and Webinar Session

Date: 15 April 2021

Day: Thursday

On this day, all of us were feeling really excited about the program that will be held on that Saturday (17-4-2021) and we were having the final discussion regarding the flow of the event and the respective tasks of executive members, AJK (Ahli Jawatankuasa) and the mentors. First of all, Dr. Azah had announced some changes in terms of the groupings. To make the evaluation process easier to be executed by her, the executive members would leave their current groups and they would be forming an independent new group. The assessment of the executive members would be based on the completeness and fulfilment of the tasks assigned by Dr. Azah. This is because they had done a lot of preparation process prior to the event including the planning of proposal, designing of Google Form, creating of meeting rooms, banners, flyers etc and it would be fair for them if they were excluded from the mentoring sessions and only groups that did not contribute much in the planning of the event would take part in the mentor-mentee slot. So what they should do throughout the module execution are just as supervisors that monitor the whole event to make sure it will run smoothly.

Then, Dr. Azah asked the original groups in which the executive members have left to either maintain as 3 or 4 members per group or to mix with other groups and most of them chose to remain as the initial groupings. For instance, none of my group members were executive members or the AJK. Therefore, our group is in charge of the mentor-mentee session throughout the whole event. My group members are as following:

Besides the executive member groups, the committee member groups would also be excepted from the mentoring session as well because they had some specific obligations to be committed. They will also be evaluated based on the tasks distributed to them by Dr. Azah beforehand. Pua Zhi Xian as the Module or Content Development committee member and his team will prepare all the teaching materials which will be used by the mentors for the mentoring session. However, mentors can also choose to prepare their own resources based on their creativity for the sharing session. Other than Pua Zhi Xian's team, there are 5 more teams that were involved in the preparation of teaching slides or videos and all of them were excluded from the mentoring session as well. They will play the role as a "library" where the mentors can obtain any information about the lesson from them. They also act as "monitors" that will visit each of the mentoring group throughout the program to ensure the mentees understand what the mentors have taught them.

Whereas, Chim Tingshing as the Media committee member and his team will need to manage the social media platforms and update all the information about the event from time to time including the TikTok Challenge. Furthermore, Dr. Azah has also requested them to organise Facebook and Instagram Live Event synchronously during the opening ceremony (Webinar Session) on this Saturday. It is because there might be special guests as well as the parents of participants who are interested to know more about our event and this has provided a suitable platform for them (outside guests who have not registered for the event) to have access on our program. For Amrin Hafiz Bin Eddy Rosyadie as the Multimedia committee member and his team, they are responsible for the poster and backdrop design. They are also required to produce an overall video after the event has ended as the requirement of GIG1005 Social Engagement University Course. The video should include the photos taken during the flow of the event and the activities being carried out. Then, the photos are compiled together into a video format and some descriptions of the activities can also be included.

Hence, there are altogether 11 groups that will carry out mentor-mentee sessions, 1 Executive Member group, 6 Module Development groups, 1 Multimedia group and 1 Social Media group (Total = 20 groups). Dr. Azah also told us that the amount of participants had shrunk to around 100 - 120 participants which include primary (Standard 5 students) and secondary (Form 1 and Form 2 students) school students. Thus, each mentor will take care of 3 mentees in a subgroup. For example, a group of 4 mentors will have 16 persons totally (4 x 3 + 4 = 16). Due to the different age groups of participants, those 2 categories will not mix and the mentoring session will be carried out separately. Therefore, one of the challenges faced by mentors is to use the same module contents but different way of sharing and execution so that the younger participants can understand the syllabus as well. We will also need to reduce the difficulty of quizzes and simplify the questions, considering the understandings of primary school students. This can make sure they will not be stressed-out and will too enjoy the program besides learning new things in a fun way in accordance with our main objective.

In addition, Dr. Azah also explained to us the difference between pre-test and post-test questions. According to her, pre-test questions will test the understanding of participant about certain topics that he or she can apply in daily life before learning something new. Whereas, post-test questions are aimed to test the comprehension of participants after we have taught them new things. After Dr. Azah has evaluated the pre-test and post-test questions prepared by Pua Zhi Xian and his team, she advised that those questions must be balanced and the amount of questions must also be similar. Other than that, we as the mentors are also responsible to encourage the participants to take part in the TikTok Challenge which is the additional competition held in our program. Although the challenge is not compulsory to join, but we should motivate them to be involved in it as there are cash prizes up to RM150 awaiting for them to grab. The detailed terms and conditions of the challenge can be seen at our Instagram as well as Facebook pages. However, some of the participants' parents might deny their kids from participating in the TikTok Challenge due to their young ages as the information of their kids will be exposed in the social media platforms to be voted. Therefore, we will not force them to engage in that activity. Besides, we are also required to change the backdrop of Microsoft Teams as shown below and use it as our background throughout the event.

In general, the modules will be conducted in a sequence of events which are pre-test, mentoring session, post-test, quiz and feedback. Pre-test, mentor-mentee slot (lecture session) and post-test will be handled by the mentors in their own subgroups while the quiz competition will be carried out in the general room by the coordinator using Kahoot where the participants can answer the questions by referring to the big screen shared together. At the end of each session, the mentees are required to fill in the feedback forms and they can drop their comments regarding this event and also their recommendations to improve it. On the other hand, the mentors will also need to assess their mentees as well based on their knowledge, teamwork skills, problem solving skills and critical thinking skills. Last but not least, we were having a dry run on Friday (16 April 2021) before the real event and the session was opened to every mentors but was compulsory for the executive members, AJK and the leader of each groups.

Date: 17 April 2021

Day: Saturday

Time: 9:00 - 11:30 a.m.

The day we all have been exciting for had finally arrived. The theme of the Webinar Session is "Learn Computer Science Without Computer" and it was held online through Microsoft Teams. Besides, there were also live events in both Instagram and Facebook as well. The session started with a short introductory video of our program and followed by speeches. The first talk was delivered by Ir. Dr. Mas Sahidayana Binti Mokhtar, Senior Lecturer in University of Malaya, about "STEM Learning: Building Future Leaders". It was indeed a fruitful sharing session by Dr. Mas. The second talk was conducted by Dr. Azah Anir Binti Norman, Senior Lecturer in University of Malaya, on the main theme which is "Computer Science Without Computer: Making Learning Fun The STEM Way". Dr. Azah is also the director of this program and her speech had brought the house down!

Then, we were having Kahoot session with the participants and they had a lot of fun during the slot. Looking at the screen as the participants answered the questions joyfully and their names appeared ups and downs had really touched me! Next, a brief on the activity modules was conducted by Pua Zhi Xian with a presentation slide. From the presentation, the mentees got to know what they will learn in the following few weeks.

Module 1: Embedding the Flow

Module 2: The Code-Breaker

Module 3: Dig-It!

Module 4: CodaKid

After that, we had a short break of 10 minutes until the participants were broken down into their respective groups. However, things did not go well as planned as we faced problems where the number of mentees was far lesser than our expectations. To curb this issue, one mentor will no longer handle 3 mentees but one group will handle around 3 mentees instead. For our group, we welcomed Noor Muhammad Thaqiff Bin Noor Ariff and Nurul Qairina Binti Abdul Rauf with open hands. However, we did not manage to contact Nur Aisyah Binti Asrullizam due to unknowing consequences. We happily announced to them that we are in Group 10 with a fancy name "WiFi". At first, the 2 mentees were feeling shy and refused to open up their webcams to communicate with us but after we showed our warmth and friendliness towards them by asking about their hobbies and ambitions, they began to talk with us. First, we introduced ourselves one by one and followed by their self introductions. We got to break the ice with them by sharing our own experience regarding Computer Science and the advantages of learning Computer Science in this new era of emerging Information Technology. We also explained to them what is actually Computer Science which is all about the learning of how computer works! We even showed them some videos about Computer Science on YouTube in the hope of enhancing their knowledge in this area and helping them to further understand the importance of Computer Science and the high demands of this sector in this competitive world.

Moreover, we also shared our own perspectives about benefits of being a computer scientist and why we chose it as our major. We even encouraged them to take up this subject as they grow up because it will surely cater a bright future for them if they work hard and a lot of job opportunities will also open widely for them in this field. After chatting with them, we realised that 2 of our mentees were actually knowing each others and they were from the same secondary school. We also found out that they volunteered themselves to take part in this event as promoted by their teachers with the intention to let them discover more on this topic. Then, we added them into a WhatsApp group that we had created earlier on. We also sent them a link to the Telegram channel of "Bits With Teens" for them to join where they can obtain every updated information of this program. Besides, we will also share details for the next few meetings on modules in the WhatsApp group to remind them of the date and time. We are looking forward to seeing them as soon as possible and feeling cheerful to share our knowledge with them. Before leaving the subgroup, all of us took photos together as a memory to be cherished.

After that, we joined the general meeting again for the announcement of competition and closing ceremony for this session. In conclusion, this program was conducted successfully with the enthusiasm of emcee, charism of mentees and sincerity of all the mentors. Finally, the program ended with a group photo.

Mentee Evaluation Form