1. How did you become more aware of your own strengths and areas for growth?
   During experience week, I went on a service trip to Cambodia. We had to create our own lesson plan to teach some 8-10-year-olds English. A few other students and I decided to design some mini-games for them to participate in, as we taught them new vocabulary. We successfully created a fun and effective learning environment for them. In this activity, I realized that one of my strengths is that I’m actually pretty good with children. I engage with them in a friendly matter to get them to actively participate in class. One of the areas for growth we found out as we reflected after the lesson, was that we could have designed a wider range of activities for the Kids to participate in. But considering that it was our first teaching experience for most of us, I’d say that we had already done a great job.
2.  How did you undertake challenges that developed new skills?
   Even though I had no teaching experience, I undertook the challenge of teaching Cambodian children English. During the lesson preparation process, I developed strong communications skills as we discussed ideas among the group. I’ve also developed cooperation skills as the teaching took a team effort. I learnt how to work with other people while also utilizing all of our individual strengths. 
3.  How did you discuss, evaluate and plan student-initiated activities?
   As a member of The Reading Tree communications and marketing team, my team members and I were in charge of promoting the event CDNISBID, and I was in charge of creating the posters. We discussed the event’s purpose and aims during meetings, and I would take notes on the information I needed to include in the poster. After I finished designing it, I was told that there was a change of dates, so I followed orders from the executive members and corrected the dates on the poster accordingly, and communicated with members from the fundraising sector as well through email. After the event, we held meetings again to reflect on what we did, and see how we can further improve. We had successfully raised quite a large amount of money which will go to the funding for our different programmes, including experience week trips and Kids4Kids. I plan to continue on with participating in this club, as it allows me to put my skills into great use and for a good cause.
4. How did you persevere in action?
   I persevered in action when I was building a house for an underprivileged family in Cambodia during experience week. The weather was extremely hot and we were working under direct sunlight. As we hammered down the nails of the house frames and weaved the walls of the house, we all became really tired. However, we knew that we were doing it for a good cause, because once we finished building the house, a family would finally have a safe and more comfortable living environment and this would have a long-lasting impact on their lives. So we all kept on encouraging each other and persevered.
   
5. How did you work collaboratively with others?
   During a fundraising event in my previous school, I worked collaboratively with others. Each class in our grade had to sell a product to raise money for a charity. For my class, we sold thermal flasks with our own designs to raise money for the Hong Kong Seeing Eye Dog Services. Our products would be sold in our annual fun fair. In this event, I worked as the fun-fair coordinator, where I was in charge of assigning tasks to my classmates on the 2 official fun fair days. I also collaborated with my classmates when it came to filming our promotional video, handling our social media promotions, contacting our product making companies, and dealing with the financial aspects of our project. The event was a success because of our team effort and collaboration.
6.  How did you develop international-mindedness through global engagement, multilingualism and intercultural understanding?
   As I went to Cambodia for a week as my CAS trip, I had the opportunity to visit a less developed area, which was extremely different from the city we live in. Being able to see how life was like for people in such areas was very eye-opening, and really made me appreciate the things I have in life right now. Building the house for the underprivileged family made me feel very fortunate to be living in Hong Kong where living conditions are so much better. Teaching the children English and Painting the school campus made me realize how lucky we are to be receiving such great education with sufficient resources and school facilities. This was definitely a meaningful experience for me, as I got to explore the Cambodian culture through temple visits and interaction with locals.
7. How did you consider the ethical implications of your actions?

Before any of these events or activities were put into action, we would always have a teacher or professional in that area go through the plan with us or supervise us to make sure that we were doing the right thing. And upon the completion of the service work, we would always reflect on what we had done and see how we can improve in the future. We also look at the events and their possible outcomes from multiple perspectives to minimize conflict.