The Battleship Just Begin!!!!

          The first week of the school, I really had no idea which class I am going to teach. The only thing I know is that I'm respectively teaching both Form 2 and Form 4 classes. I reached at SMK (P) Taman Petaling around 7.05am. My partner, Shila and I waited for 10minutes at the office to meet our Guru Penolong Kanan(GPK). Pn.Saras is the GPK of the school and welcomed us with a smile. She gave us the timetable of the classes and asks us to choose which classes we want. I got the second best class for my Form 2 and middle class for my Form 4. She also explained to us what we need to do and surprisingly she gave us one week to observe the classes. Even though our mentor is the same person, but we have four different teachers for four different classes. It means that each of us has two different teachers to evaluate us.

          I went to my Form 2 class and I found out that a few of them were very active in the class. But most of them preferred to be silent in the class. For my Form 4 class, unfortunately the teacher who supposed to come to the class was not there. So I decided to do ice breaking with them. My first impression towards them.. "They were very good". Well first impression is not always the best. I went to see the teacher of my Form 4 class. And what she told me was the class has an attitude problem and all the teachers are not satisfied with them. I was thinking how I am going to handle the students. I went to all the classes including shila's class to observed how the lesson is carried out. For my Form 2, the teacher told me that I need to be careful with four Chinese students who are sitting at the back of the class. This is because, they like to talk and do their own work and sometimes they will be very stubborn. Another problem that I am going to face. Both of my classes there are attitude problems.

          The first week was good because we have not started to teach yet. And the real "war" started at the second week of the school. I went to my Form 2 class and as what my teacher told me, the four Chinese students they did not listen to me. They kind of "bully" me because they were talking in mandarin. I was so pissed off.  The same thing happened in my Form 4 class. But the situation is different. The first class on Monday was after recess. So most of them came in late to the class. I waited for 20minutes for them. And when I teach, they didn't even respond to me. And some of them sleeping in the class. When I asked they said "she is not feeling well teacher". Everyday there will be at least one student lying down on the table. 

          For my Form 2 class, the next day I decided to have a proper strategy on how to tackle the four students as they are the main group that will be making noise in the class.What I did? When I was teaching, they were doing their own work. I went to their place and asked them what are they doing. They said nothing. And when I walked away, they started to talk in Mandarin. So I told them. For your information I know 5 languages. The interesting part is four of them started to think what are the languages that I know. I think that it is the best strategic to make them to pay attention in the class. And the awkward moment when they talked in Mandarin and I will try my best to answer them in English according to the question they asked. At the same time I am learning the language as well. Until now I did not tell them the truth. It's almost 3 weeks I'm in SMKPTP, and now I really love my Form 2 kids because I managed to grab their attention to listen to me. All the four students listened to me, do their work, and "advised" me not to go to block D because it is haunted. How sweet they are. Finally I got the chance to know about them. I am not lying to my students but I am trying to make them to listen and concentrate in my lesson. Hope it is not a "sin". :) The problem for my Form 2 class is solved. Now my job is to deliver proper knowledge and prepare them for their final examination.

         For my Form 4 class, I have tried so many techniques but nothing worked. I tried to be nice but they are making me like an idiot. If I'm being stern, they will only follow my instruction for a while. And they will start again their "unchangeable" attitude. I have talked to my teacher and she advised me to be stern at the same time try to be nice. Because boys if the teacher says anything they still will consider it. But girls they will keep it into their heart and will revenge back. Oh My God!!!!! Until now I could not handle my Form 4 class. Always at least 7 students will be absent in a day. Just imagine that, what kind of students I have to deal with. My problem with this class is still not solved yet.

          I am hoping if anyone can give me new strategic to handle this class. I think that's all for now.. We will meet again on week 6 to share our experience.

No mountain high enough!

3rd week. Ahhh~ Feels like I have been teaching since forever. That human nature of adapting to new surrounding is amazing. To be honest, I did not feel like I could assimilate myself amongst experienced teachers in the school at first yet they made me feel like a part of the family. They make me feel at home. I am really blessed to have found caring and wonderful senior teachers.

My seat is rather lucky I would say. It used to belong to another teacher who moved away recently so I was placed there next to Madam Martita who teaches BM. She gives me gifts most of the time. Yes, she is an angel in disguise. I swear to God she is. Not only that, Madam Shanty is another angel. She sits opposite Mdm. Martita and they are both really sweet and lovely. Not just them of course, the rest of the teachers as well.

It was not a great start during my first week there as I was down with food poisoning on the fourth day of teaching. It was not due to food from the school mind you but it was something that I had the night before. Anyway, I had this really terrible diarrhoea and vomiting the moment I woke up that morning. I went to school thinking that I could at least pull through the day and I managed to relieve one class. *beams* However, the teachers saw that I was seriously pale and weak so they managed to convince me to take the remaining of the day off. So I went to see the doctor and got myself a medical certificate. I definitely did not like the feeling of not being in control especially towards my own body.

During the first week, I managed to enter a few relief classes and as usual, students like 'fresh meat'. *laughs* To me, trainee teachers are like a pop of fresh colours to their otherwise mundane and dull school life. So when they saw Alia and I, they were very excited and kept asking questions such as, "Miss, where are you from?", "How old are you?", "Do you have a boyfriend?" and so forth. Seeing those students reminded me of my secondary years. They are the epitome of youth and innocence.

Anyway my assigned classes for English are 4 Science 2 and 4 Arts 2. Oh how they differ! *grins* The science stream students are leaning towards the textbooks style of learning and the arts stream students are very boisterous. Hence I schemed for their activities. I know I must break away from their comfort zone yet at the same time utilizing their strengths. I wanted to make a change in my students. Hence, I did a debating style with my 4S2 girls and I brought them out of the classroom. The topic was on 'Future Shopping' and boy oh boy, they loved it to bits! Even when my double period ended, they were still debating on the topic. On the other hand, I made use of the extra energy by my 4A2 girls by injecting the fun element (eg, charades) into my lesson plan. They are the type who love to move about in class so I did an activity which maximizes movements especially running around and learning at the same time. Guess they will never see English lessons the same way ever again. *laughs*

I have also discovered that one of my Arts stream students is suffering from dyslexia. This means she cannot really read and spell properly so I pay attention to this problem by focusing on slowing down my teaching and one on one tutoring. It is important to realise the differences in your students before commencing future lessons because if you do not find the cause of the problem, it is hard for you to solve it. Just like pulling weed out of the ground to stop them from growing, same concept applies to teaching. Apparently some teachers have told me that some of the students do not usually hand in their homework but I am the type who prefer to conduct the tried-and-tested method so I delivered my first homework to them and true enough, some did not hand in their essays.

What I did was to punish them by making them literally PAY for their laziness. Mind you I do not use their money for personal purposes, I keep them aside. I just want them to realise that they cannot get away with their laziness and even if I give them demerit points, they would not be afraid because their term is ending and when the school year begins next year, their personal point system is of clean slate. Hence I tried this method of imposing fines on them and it worked! Oh my goodness I did not believe how effective that was. I told them that if they do not hand in their essay on the designated date, they are required to pay me RM2 and RM1 for every subsequent day. If the next time they decided to be lazy again, the fine will be twice as the original which makes it RM4 per essay. I mean imagine this, how much longer can the student pay the fine without going broke? I know it may sound mean to some of you but I like to use reverse psychology method. Lo and behold, they diligently handed in their essays on time and so far I have only collected RM4 which means only 2 students did not hand in (but at this time of writing they have already handed in their work). I have no plans on spending the money but to return them on the last day of my teaching but of course they do not know that. It is just a little lesson to teach them the effectiveness of imposing fines.

On the other hand, 2 days ago, my supervisor Dr. Dorothy came to observe me in school and I must admit, I was super nervous hours before she observed me. After getting feedbacks from her, I know I will always have room for improvement and I appreciate all the positive feedbacks she gave. *smiles*

All in all, I have a very good relationship with my students. Class control is not a problem as this school is not known to be famous for its disciplinary problem but famous for academics. All the students are polite and helpful as well as united. This is something which is rare for most people and I am really proud of the girls for being able to look past each other's differences despite the differing race and religion. A united society begins with a united generation. Last but not least, I am enjoying myself in Assunta very much! =)

Warmest regards,
Winnie Nelson

La Salians

Its been 3 weeks now and being a part of La Salians makes me proud at times as the school is famous. I had some problem in my first week as i was teaching the Peralihan Class and the students drove me crazy and I had no smile on my face in the class, well it did not last long as me & Fahrul were made amphibian teachers (hihihi) where we have different time of teaching which is evening, semi morning-evening and morning. We were given form 4 and form 2.

I'm can go on with the form 2 students as they still young but the only hurdle is they are not proactive enough and i managed that by giving them puzzles as set induction and use the answers for my teaching and the students liked it very much.

The form 4 students are kind of a mess was I guess I can manage them at one point as none of them skip my class. I've tried group discussion but it makes the class to be out of control and even triggered 2 fights at once and as the school is now facing severe discipline problems, this method seems to be inviting danger hence I'm going to try a new method.

It was very interesting as I was showing the boys video clips for educational purposes but the boys were only focusing on the ladies in the video and even mocked me when I said 'fish pond', I replied by saying "Guys, its POND and PORN"... that made them laugh. For me, I did not know the porn when I was in form 2 but these boys are way ahead.

The school final examinations is around the corner and now the focus is on revisions and my teaching would be related on revising the topics they have learnt. The usage of technology such as LCD is limited as their Bilik Jauhari (LCD room) has some issues with the LCD and its not clear and worst there are no speakers but there is a place called Dewan Kuliah and I will be using that soon.

The experience I'm gaining in La Salle is hard to find anywhere else I guess.

Don't Agonize, Be Organize!

Hello, hello my lovely mates :)

How are you? I miss all of you so much. I hope everything is going fine. Well, it is the 3rd week of our practical, how time flies so fast.. till today, i have been observed once by my mentor as well as by my supervisor.. all is well but it is not that bad and it is not that fabulous.. Whatever it is, don't give up and feel sad okay. We are all learning from mistakes that mistakes will make us a better person.. so SMILE :)

The first week of teaching, I could feel the tense and a million things running down my head.. How am I going to face the students? What if they make fun of me? or worst What if they don't respect me and step over my head?.. all of these things made me nervous and shaky all day.

I entered my Form 1 Jujur class on Tuesday (4th Sept 2012), it was a 2 hours straight lesson. I started by doing some ice-breaking activities. The students were all excited and anticipated for games and fun lessons from me. I admitted that I talked a lot that day because I really want the students to pay attention and listen to me. But after some time, they are becoming restless and started making noises and moves around. That is the biggest challenged I have faced so far. Then, we did summary exercise and surprisingly, when I asked them to do the exercise and pass up to me by the end of the lesson, they were silent, remain sitted at their places and quietly getting the tasks done and guess what? they managed to complete their summary exercise and submit it in just 30 minutes time. So? I learnt that the students learning style are not fully depending on the teacher, they would love to have some group activities and have time on their own to accomplish the tasks given to them.

I have overcome the challenges by getting my lesson more proper and organize, have less worries and just be pleasant with the students but I have to be strict and stern sometimes. More importantly, I designed my lesson and make sure it is communicatively balanced between the teacher and students. I will give them some times to discuss in groups, having formal interactions with me, have an activities in classroom to keep them active and let them present their works. It spot on and the students loves it.

For my form 2 Jujur class, the students are brilliant, creative, loves to talk and some of them are shy. What I have done so far are, 60% 40% techniques. I will talk, explain, gives feedback, encouraging them to get involved before I asked them to work individually, pairs or in groups. They listened well and thank God all lessons are well conducted till today.

I realized that we cannot have too much worries and we have to expect everything to be good and positive. We are all not perfect, we made mistakes, sometimes what we have planned out does not working and sometimes what we think are the best could be the worst. So comrades, keep your chin up, be bold and be confident. Don't Agonize but Be Organize :)

Allow me to share some pictures from my lessons. Enjoy them :)

Don't make them feel bored

"Don't make them feel bored", this was the answer I got when I asked the teacher how to have a good classroom control.

Dr. Adele mentioned time flies, well time never flies if we try not to stay, while I can never deny the fact that the past two weeks were rather faster than I've ever expected.

OK, the problems in teaching. The first shock came on the first day when I was told to teach the both classes (2A1&2A3) using their Form 2 textbooks, and beginning with different chapters. Anyhow I had to follow what the two teachers told me to do, yet I still felt grateful as they said YES when I asked if I was allowed to add my own things as long as I managed to cover the topics on the textbook. Frankly speaking I realized my training would be suffering if I stick to the things on the textbook right after the first class, which I used the things in the textbook, I could see students were actually looking forward to a whole new experience instead of the same old things they already got used to in their daily studies, so regarding this issue, what I have been trying to do in my classes is to come up with my own ideas and activities within the realm of the topics and themes provided by the textbook, which so far hasn't made the students feel bored yet. 

The biggest problem for now, if I can put it so, should be the constantly practice thing they have been having for almost 2 weeks, which left me with only half of the class in most periods and it's quite hard to carry out the activities I planned, so I had to adjust the amounts of activities, groups and group members accordingly during the class. But lucky they won't be having any practice from next week, we were told that all things would be finished by this Friday after the concert.

The classroom discipline is so much better than I expected as well, meaning to say so far it didn't bring me any problem to control the class. "Don't worry, my girls won't bring you any trouble", said my 2A1 teacher Ms Usha, haha.

Once again, best of luck for all my friends in days to come!

And allow me to greet all of you with our Assunta way: Thank you, and God bless you!

Students' mind maps

Little cakes from students for Wang Yi & me

"Leaving students with homework=Extra work for teachers" TRUE :P

What happened to you, my little soldiers?

Sek. Men (J) Keb. Katholik
17 Sep 2012

Hi, fellows~
Tomorrow is another bran-new day and its about one hour later. Im now trying to get some sleep, but before that I really need to share my teaching days with you.
The first of school, I was assigned to two Form 4 classes which make me feel the teaching methods I learnt in university are total useless. They look like kids, but they are not! I tried and tried to attract their attention and interests. The reslut is just not what I expect. I tried everything I have- pictures,pop music, slides, videos and more. However, their feedbacks are killing me~ They hate group discussion, debat, role play and etc. Now I am the only one who get excited in the class.. :(
They are good kids though. Even they were not exciting about my lesson but still sit up straight and maintain the class discipline well. They will do whatever I ask them to. Its just, I dont feel good or feel satisfied with these. I want more. I want to become that kind of teacher who could make the whole class get excited and wish to learn more.
After the lessons, I like to ask my students what they feel about the activities. They told me that the lesson is fine but they kind of knew that I am the training teacher, so what I taught them are not going to their finals. In the other hand, their final exams are coming soon. They are all under pressure right now..

>.<  ... ...  Fellows, what should I do?!

Tomorrow is another bran-new day and I had planed an interesting lesson(Wish I was right) for them. Good luck to me! Good luck to everyone!!

Fear not, just get involved ....

29th August 2012   Briefing Day

Since i knew our teaching practice last semester, i had kept thinking of it for long time. “What kind of school am i going?” “Will i be able to deal with the tough situation?”...every time, i tell myself, “it’s alright, you still have time”. However, today is different, i have no other choice, the journey starts. I got posted at SMK Bukit Bandaraya, Bangsar, together with my good girls Mafia, Athira and Eza. I was quite excited because we know each other well and it makes me feel warm. 

In the afternoon, we planned to see the location of the school. With the help of Eza, we arrived the second home, our school. It is still the school time, although we cannot go inside, i can still hear the noises made by students and my heartbeat, as well. Anyway, i remind myself to remember Dr. Adele’s words “Calm down, they are just children”.  

30th August 2012   First formal visit to school

Today, Mafia and I, we both wear Baju Kurung and we wish that it will bring us good luck. As Athira and Mafia said in last few reflections, when we first stepped into the school, we were not that welcomed, anyway, things goes better very soon. We met the school principal Pn Nooraini. She is very warm-heated and after her brief introduction of school, she tells us that “after you girls leave this school, you have no problem with any schools”. No matter this is a reminder or encouragement, i know that we have to be ready for the coming challenge, we are thirsty now and we have to learn.

Pn Nooraini assigned Chief Clerk to show us around the school compound, with Eza and Athira’s help, translating from Malay to English, we tried to get what chief said. Without understanding what chief said directly, i have the feelings that i am the strangers here. I was worrying “Will foreign teachers be welcomed by students?” “ Will the students bully us by using Malay?” ....the endless questions surrounded in my mind.

After getting the tables in staff room, we met our mentor Cik Thiagaranee. We can feel that she was quite happy to see us, but she looks busy. Later we know that the school lacks of teachers these days because a lot of teachers on leave. Actually, our coming is kind of timely help for the school. We should feel lucky because we have more opportunities to gain the experience than others. 

Later, we met Pn Siti, administrator of school, who assigned the class to us. I was assigned to teach Form 2 AMANAH and form 4 IKHLAS. Pn Siti told me that form 2 class’s level is quite low and form 4 is okay, higher than middle. I’m fine with it because i always believe lower mark students always have the most potential, compared to the top students. I am not sure i can make them be the best, but i believe i can make them better. I always remember “ if things donnot go the way you expect, make the best of the things you have”.

3rd September 2012  First Day in School

The school introduced us to the students in the morning assembly. We were welcomed by the students, we guess they are curious about us. Talking with some senior teachers in the school, we get some information about our own assigned classes. I was shocked when one of the teachers gave me a sign of “kill”when I mention about form 2 AMANAH. Whatever, everything will be fine, i can make it. Some teachers told us donnot smile too much on the first class and you have to be very strict. I listen and do what they remind us. Monday, i donnot have too many classes, the first classes i got is 2 relief classes, i asked teachers what to do in relief class, they told us just be strict and let them do the assignment. I did what they told me and i was extremely strict in the first class, i found that students do respect you but they afraid to talk. I was upset because i think i kill their willingness to talk. In the second relief class, i try to be myself, smile at the right time and be strict at the right time. Surprisingly, the situation became totally different. Students feel comfortable with the situation, including me. :) i think the best way to be a good teacher is to be who you are.

The first day of my assigned class is also good, they are quite high compared with other classes. They listened to me a lot in the first class and i think this is a good start. Just wish everything goes well day by day! :)

Sorry for late posting

AND best wishes for all my other course mates! 

ZHAO XUNYU