We are currently a month away from our big SEASAC tournament and there is no one in our team who isn’t excited. Just coming off a well-fought tournament in Bangkok(came second), the team has been looking better than ever. Our chemistry has been through the roof, it was almost as if we developed a family-like bond. Throughout the season so far my collaboration and communication skills have immensely grown, me being someone who isn’t socially gifted, led to me being barely speaking at the start, to yelling and trying to motivate our team on the courts.  The experiences with this team have been unforgettable, we have gone through all the ups and downs a sports team could go through, being trashed and blaming one another, to being some of the most supportive people and backing each other up by giving constructive feedback or reassurance. These experiences have taught me what it takes to be a good teammate and how a simple statement such as “good job” or “don’t worry about it” can change how someone performs.

The tournament in Bangkok was a real eye-opener for me, it helped me realise how good of a team we can be when we try and taught me the importance of giving a hundred percent effort at all times.  I came back to Singapore feeling accomplished after the tournament, not just because of how well we played as a team, but the improvement we had gone through in the tournament. Prior to the Bangkok trip, our team had never played at such a high level, and this limited our chances at improvement. Which is why we did our best to embrace to opportunity and maximize our time there. We ran multiple different plays and displayed flashes of potential our team could be playing like. However, an issue we encountered was our mental game, there were certain times where if we had a bad play, we’d end up losing our focus and motivation. This conveyed how important our momentum and collaboration was.

Overall, the season so far has been memorable. As a team, we have developed tremendously and are learning to collaborate with one another better each and every game. However, as a player, I felt that I have progressed as a teammate. But, could still learn to work on being a better leader.

LO 5 COLLABORATION (Working together to achieve an outcome)

•  Who did I collaborate with?
•  What made it easy or difficult to work together with this person/people?
•  What challenges did we face when working together? How did we overcome them? Why couldn’t we overcome some challenges?
•  How important was collaboration to achieving the outcome or my goal?
•  What could I do in future to be a more effective team player?