Formal Letter

Dear Prof Blackstone,

My name is Chin Yong Sheng, so you may also address me as Mark. I am a student in class T6 of MEC1281. I would like to use this letter to introduce myself. I graduated from Ngee Ann Polytechnic with a diploma in Aerospace Technology. Upon graduation, I ended up working under the Republic of Singapore Airforce (RSAF) for the next 5 and a half years, prior to pursuing my degree study in mechanical engineering under Singapore Institute of Technology. 

Having only been in the engineering field ever since my tertiary education, I learnt to appreciate engineering more. Engineering has benefited mankind in different aspects through technology advancements leading to improvement in quality of life. Working in the RSAF has piqued my interest in engineering. My primary scope is to upkeep aircraft's serviceability through rectification works. I managed to witness and experience how the combination of mechanisms with electronics is able to bring everything together. For example, selecting the landing gear for deployment through a simple gear stick seems easy. Behind the scene of such a simple act consists of electronic sensors and mechanical actuators which are responsible for the execution. This allows me to appreciate engineering even more, thus decided to pursue a degree in mechanical engineering.

One communication weakness that I possess is the lack of ability to read the room. There have been multiple occasions where I had ticked off conversing partner. For example, I might still be conversing in a joyous tone while discussing important matters on hand  One communication strength that I possess is the ability to listen well to others. I tend to let others convey their thoughts across before providing my feedback. This provides me with the opportunity  to learn from others and provide new insights on the topic of discussion. 

Towards the end of this module, I aim to improve on my sentence structures as well as grammatical mistakes. Another goal which I have in mind would be to learn the different ways in writing an email based on my relationship with the recipients. 

Lastly, thank you for taking time out to read this email. 

Yours sincerely,

Chin Yong Sheng 

Edited 05/04/21

Comments

  1. Jin Yao20 January 2021 at 19:19

    This, formal letter have clear and concise of messages for each paragraph, the points are well organized and elaborate to a good extend. The letter also have good structure and tone, it ended off nicely and politely by thanking the reader. Overall, the letter have no grammatical and punctuation.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Brad Blackstone22 January 2021 at 20:22

    Dear Mark,

    Thank you for this fairly detailed introductory letter. You cover the basic parameters of the assignment, and though you don't detail every section, this letter is provocative. Here's what I mean by that: I'm impressed by the fact that you spent five years in the airforce, but you need more of an explanation of what you actually did there to give substance to that statement. Also, you state that one comm weakness is your inability to "communicate appropriately to superiors," but you give no explanation. That leads readers to have a surface understanding at best.

    There also seems to be a contradiction between what you assess as a strenth and a weakness. How can a good listener also have problems communiacting with your superiors? Actually, it's interesting that you mention this, since I note the same in our class. When you are tracking what we are doing, you seem to respond well, but at times you seem distracted by your phone or a conversation with others. I'd say our class is the perfect time for you to work on refining your weaknesses and bolstering your strengths.

    You astutely recongnize that you jave some grammar/writing issues. Here are some specific ones for you to consider:

    1. sentence structure
    -- My name is Chin Yong Sheng, which you may also address me as Mark. > (wrong subordinating conjunction) My name is Chin Yong Sheng, so you may also address me as Mark.

    -- Witnessing and experiencing the combination of mechanisms with electronics which transformed into a flying machine. > (sentence fragment: see https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/academic_writing/sentence_variety/sentence_types.html ) ?

    -- Therefore, deciding to continue pursuing a degree in mechanical engineering. > (sentence fragment)

    Let's work on these, Mark, and let's address the bigger picture too in class of bringing you fully onboard with being a class leader since you have lots of real world experience.

    Cheers,

    Brad

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yong Sheng31 January 2021 at 07:14

      Dear Prof Brad,

      Thank you for highlighting how both my communication's strength and weakness contradicts with each other. I failed to express my thoughts thoroughly through my initial letter.

      I will try my best to refrain myself from using my phone in the future and pay attention while someone's else is speaking.

      Lastly, thank you for writing such a detailed breakdown on my formal introduction letter.

      Rgs,
      Mark

      Delete
  3. Leonard Gay Bing Shuen24 January 2021 at 18:12

    Can't really see any mistakes in terms of grammar and punctuations. Nice sentence structure, and the flow of each paragraph is good. I agree with prof Brad that you can share more about your 5 years experience to give your readers more insights.

    If I were to say one C that you may be lacking in, it would be just the concreteness of your letter

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yong Sheng30 January 2021 at 21:59

      Hi there Leonard. I will definitely add on to the points mentioned above by both you and Prof Brad as reading back my initial post, I realised that I have failed to elaborate on my points.

      Thank you for the feedbacks!

      Delete
  4. Wei Jie28 January 2021 at 04:09

    The formal letter is well-structured. All points are brief and concise. The ending is polite and friendly. So far there is no grammatical and punctuation errors.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yong Sheng30 January 2021 at 22:01

      Thank you Wei Jie for taking time out to read my blog's post and your feedbacks.

      Delete

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