Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences                                      
A Fieldtrip to Sarawak

The old cliché says every picture is worth a thousand words. That came true on a field trip in September 2006 to Sarawak. 16 Honours-year students and three academic staff from the Department of History explored the colonial and decolonisation history of that state. They drove out one day on a prearranged visit to a kampong near the border with Kalimantan, inhabited by the indigenous Bidayu people.

The team's mission was to explore the border area around Kampong Stass, the site of an old Commonwealth military installation used from 1963 through 1966 as part of the campaign to defend Malaysia during the Confrontation with Sukarno's Indonesia. The Stass area was the scene of frequent military engagements, and it was hoped that the visit would help students better understand the military dimension of the conflict. The kampong leaders took it a step further. When the team arrived in Stass, the entire population, all wearing traditional costume, turned out to greet the team and treated the team to a presentation on the history and culture of the Bidayu people. This included photos and souvenirs from the Confrontation, as well as discussions with local survivors of that period. But the highlight of the visit came when the hosts insisted that the three academic staff join them in the ritual Bidayu dance to purify the meal presented to honoured guests. While jumping up and down, trying to follow the gyrations of the hosts, the staff looked up to find every student filming away, between doubling over in laughter. The Bidayu did what the staff could never have done: they made themselves, and therefore their history, come alive for students. That pleasant surprise was a teaching moment and a good reminder that the extra effort can pay off in unexpected ways.

NUS academics and Bidayu village elder, Sarawak, September 2006

School of Design and Environment                                      
Using the Virtual World to Model Real World Problems

As virtual reality becomes increasingly popular as a teaching and learning tool, it was introduced in a module, BU4280 "Development and Building Economics" in Semester 2, Academic Year 2006/2007, to show students how real world problems can be better visualised through the use of Information Technology (IT). In the construction industry, the complexity of problems often relate to product design, process coordination and human communication. Hence, multi-dimensional modelling for enhanced visualisation is key. By using a common platform, IT will allow various participants of a construction project to understand, communicate and share design and process information more effectively.

The demonstration of the virtual building tool in lectures provides students with a three-dimensional view of a 'walk-through' in a proposed building. The aim is to let students see that when one is operating in a complex project environment, a clearer visualisation of the situation through the use of IT can help one better understand, plan and deal with the problems as early as possible in the process. Overall, it was much easier to bring this point across as students could watch, learn, as well as enjoy the media display, all at the same time.