This is Me Signing Out For EDU 3217...

Reminiscence Times

Oh my lord!!! What a semester it had been? The time moves so freaking fast that I was left behind without even realizing it. This would be my last entry for this course; however, I will probably continue to post my blogs in the future as my own reflection and stay connected with my friends.

What initially started off as a burden and boring task, eventually turned to be some sort of a refreshing and interesting experience as days went by. The whole process to me now has become a great way for me to express myself and express my feelings. Not only that, the idea of being able to actually voice out point of views and get the feedback from my peers in a respective and professional manner was in a way really rejuvenating.

Throughout the course, after every lesson taught, every plays read, and every activities conducted, sometimes, I was always left with a missing pieces in the lesson. Through the blogs I have read, the missing links however connected again. This is definitely because we could actually voice out the misunderstandings and confusions and guide each other in the understanding of the plays. The explanation by Dr. Edwin was definitely explicit and thorough in every lesson; however, after a quite some times, this information will fade away if we do not reinforce them. Through the activity of blogging this reinforcement could be carried out.

I am strongly believes that the idea of doing this activity really helps students to improve in their study and be more reflective in their life. That is provided we have the connection to the internet and sufficient time to actually sit down and type our blogs, little less other assignment perhaps??hehe.. and oh yes, I have to admit, writing the blogs was not all the time wonderful happy hours of my life, there were times when I have to post again and again and have to wait like until the earth completely circle the sun to get passed the horrible so called wireless connection.

Last but not least, I would like to express a whole some of gratitude to Dr. Edwin for the times that he had went through with us. He had made the whole process seemingly easier then it was actually was. All the experiences really paid off at the end right? We had caused him so many trouble and difficulties but being such a professional man that he is, all those did not affect his teaching in class. I could not imagine doing the course with some other people with the same level of understanding that he had given me.

Until I have the decency in time to blog again, this is me, signing out!

Have a great year everyone and good luck in exams!!

Journey Towards Becoming the Better Teacher

Simulated Teaching – How About a Reflection?

The whole idea of simulated teaching seems absurd to me at first. This is due to the fact that in the real world, I know for fact that we will not have the decency of using all the aids that we were using during our simulated teaching. For example, the high tech gadgets like the ict gadgets and the projector. At first, I thought it was rather nonsense for this whole situation does not reflect the reality at least not here in local context. However, as times goes by, I have found out that, it was not only at the gadgets and how to use them that matter, rather, how we manipulate situation and used what we have and finally find a way to reach to the students.

I used the play, The Ring by Vincent Jeremiah Edwin as my text to teach to the students. As for my set induction, I had used the real true blue footage of an imaginary ghost friend that a daughter of a Japanese family was talking to. This issue has something in common to the issue in The Ring, which is imaginary friend of course. The footage was shown to trigger the interest in the students to explore the text. To be the key initiator to make them more interested in the text.

Later, in my pre and while reading activity, I have provided the students with extract from scene 6. From this extract, students were asked to identify the major characters and highlight them. Afterward, I had asked them to used the characters they have identify and put it in the allocated tables, and then they need to find the traits of the characters and support their answers with evidence from the text.

I would say that the activities I had conducted were successfully done based on the participation and the interaction from the students. Eventually, I had also found that the evaluation processes in the end prove to be a meaningful one for in the process of evaluating our friends, in a way, we were evaluating ourselves as well. I had also found that the comments and suggestions made by my peers will help me a lot in the future to convey the role of a dedicated teacher.

I was told and almost could tell that there will be a whole series of stimulated teaching will be coming next semester. All I can say is that I’m ready for it this time around, and I do hope I would have done it better next time and improvise in any way I have to. I’m most certain that in a way, all of these processes will eventually lead to the process of becoming a good and quality teacher in the future.

A Provocative Author in His Own Right - Kee Thuan Chye

The Real Deal – Meeting the Author

Kee Thuan Chye, the name would not be an alien in local arts scene. Talented in many ways, he had involved in many television series such as Kopitiam and some other famous series. In this course, one of the interesting yet complex plays we have to study on was from his very own hands – Swordfish, Then The Concubine. We were told since we were very child in drama that eventually, we’ll get the chance to meet one of the authors whose play will be our material of study for this semester. There are several plays we have to study on, starts with Oedipus Rex, Swordfish, King Lear and Streetcar Name Desires. Everyone was very excited to see him for not only he is a public figure that we had seen so many times on tv, but also for the fact that he is also a literature people if I may say, like us! This meeting will definitely broaden our perspective towards drama and play.

It is not a secret that Kee Thuan Chye is indeed one of the controversial writers in this nation, he had tackled certain issue that others were not brave enough to discuss, he is also brave enough to provoke thought in the readers through his masterpieces on certain issue pertaining the political structure and inequality that took place. However, certain issues especially politics, there will always be different side of story or different point of view that will in the end, contradicts each other.

As for me, I’m not taking side on any party, not because I didn’t care, but simply because I feel that there is no need for me to voice out loud yet especially when I’m still under government scholarship for the degree program. Others might disagree, but this is my point of view and I’m entitled of it, right? Besides that, I profoundly believes that there are just so much more happenings that we didn’t get or exposed to by reading the newspapers or watching the news on television. So, who am I to strongly criticize and condemn somebody just by the hearsays that most of the times turn out to be a strategy to gain popularity? Hey, don’t get me wrong, sure I know that we must choose the best component to lead our government, but now? Really? Let me worry about the acne and the puppy love that I’m having first, and then maybe I could starts to worry about the whole nation as I’m a decade older and should have been wiser!

I was extremely surprised upon meeting Kee Thuan Chye at the first time and even more amazed with his uses of language. At first, in our own imagination, we were so much into the notion of believing that Kee Thuan Chye would have been more arrogant in his speaking for he is actually somebody with names that people recognize and not to mention in the rich and famous line up.

He was very unselfish and very insightful in his speech. All that he had mentioned eventually appeal to the senses of a true literary movement.