Thinking from a student's perspective

During my attachment, I got to teach two classes of Sec 1 academic students science.

Partly out of curiosity, I used two different methods: the first one being the whiteboard and visualizer while the other being the computer using the software prezi as well as showing videos related to the concept that I was about to teach. Both were on the topic of osmosis. It was pretty evident that the class which was taught using the whiteboard and visualizer got kinda bored after awhile and it was pretty hard to keep them engaged for long. Being secondary 1 students from the academic stream, there was a need to keep them engaged through hands-on activities or interesting nuggets to keep them awake. As expected, I got a totally different response from the other class. They were almost swooning over the visuals I used in my class which got them talking and listening more attentively during class. I even brought some water babies during class to illustrate the concept of osmosis. Some students even requested for more water babies to bring home so that they can do it on their own. One student got so excited that he shouted out to me when I walked past the class to tell me that his water babies had grown. It made me realize that teaching is not merely the delivering of content itself, you need to tailor it specially for your students so that they can understand it to the best of their own abilities. One may be good at delivering content but how much can you confidently say that you have successfully engaged your students and they have truly learnt from your lessons? Being in the age of technology, our students are indeed getting more IT-savvy. It is vital that we make full use of IT during lessons to engage them and enhance their learning. Teaching can no longer be done using the merely the traditional whiteboard style that our generation is used to.

One of the difficulties in teaching a normal academic class was getting them to translate what they have learnt into writing. Usually in between lessons and after lessons, I would give them a short test verbally and get them to answer questions on the spot related to what I had taught so far as a way to consolidate and reinforce their learning. They did not have any problems answering my questions and I was pleased as it showed that they understood the lesson. However, when the exact same questions were given to them in the form of structured questions on paper, they were evidently stumped by it. Honestly, I was rather taken aback by what I saw. If they could answer the questions verbally, then why were they stumped by the same questions in words? Weren't they the same? I guess it boiled down to their language ability ( ability to express their answer in words and proper sentences) It dawned upon me that there was nothing wrong in their science concepts but rather, they are often penalized based on their ability to write their answers in proper sentences. This is rather unfortunate. I asked myself: Are exams testing their knowledge of science or the use of their language? I guess it could be more beneficial for them if their examination could be in verbal form or some help in the form of helping words or filling in of blanks.

As adult teachers, we tend to take for granted certain concepts that seem so easy to us but may be difficult for the students. One important lesson that I took away from my mentor is that I should sit down and think through what are the things that the kids do not know, it could be in the form of new words, jargon that we may take for granted. Always always put yourself in the shoes of the students. Some students may be slower learners so we need to be aware of that and slow down pace for them to digest and understand.

Break down information into bite-size bits for them, repeat key words every now and then every if it means being very naggy. Some of these students from the academic stream are visual learner so they need to see concepts visually. Using real life analogies that are applicable to their daily lives would be extremely helpful in their learning and make it relevant to them!

Just some thoughts :)

Major pet peeves and anger management

While I am generally a patient person with a high tolerance level (or so i think!), there are some things that upsets me pretty much I admit. However, you won't see me flaring up though. If I do, then it must have been something really heinous. (haha) My friends think I do not get angry at all, which is entirely not true. I usually just keep it in and hold it as much as I can, which is not very healthy either in my opinion. One of the signs that I am angry or upset is when I turn unusually quiet. I try to sort out the negative thoughts and calm myself down. It helps that I pray and ask God to help me forgive the person or people in question. The anger doesn't go away instantly but you get a sense of calm that helps you to be more rational at dealing with the issue. Sometimes I feel tempted to stay angry at the person or people in question for long periods of time or ignore them, but it just doesn't seem right to me either. The problem is, I don't confront people and tell them straight in their face that I am angry with them, so they probably wouldn't even know. The whole cycle begins when they start committing the very same things that upsets me. Major sighs.

How do you usually deal with your anger? Do you keep it in or let it out?

I am sure everyone has their major pet peeves that will trigger their anger alarm off. It will definitely vary from person to person. But for me, these are some of the things that I can't really tolerate.

WARNING: long-winded post ahead

Tardiness

One of the most major pet peeves I have is people being late. Not to say I have never been late before.

I am pretty sure this is something everyone would have experienced at some point of their lives. Say, you organize an outing and set the meeting time at 6pm. You set out all enthusiastic and get yourself ready for the meetup. Being a punctual person, you would actually plan to reach the place at least 5-10 minutes early. I do know of some people who would actually reach half an hour early to make sure that they will not be late. That is a very commendable behaviour that I rarely see in Singaporeans nowadays, sad to say. However, as the clock ticks 6pm, you do not see any of your friends arriving. Slowly but surely, the texts start trickling in. It goes like this "Hey sorry I will be very late/late". It suddenly dawns upon you that you are the only one who is there and punctual while all your friends will be late. At this point of time, my mood will be badly affected when I was looking forward to the outing. I know it is unrealistic to expect people to arrive early or on the dot since it is so ingrained in our culture to be late. I do not mind waiting for 10-15 minutes, but anything more than 30 minutes is unacceptable. Also, if it happens once or twice, it is totally fine but if it happens all the time, then it definitely reveals how much importance a person accords to the meeting.

                                  #truestory

To me, being punctual is showing basic respect to others. It also reveals your level of integrity when you are constantly tardy. If you tell someone that you will meet them at a certain agreed time, you have essentially made them a promise. By being late, you have essentially broken that promise as well. Overtime, it will definitely put a strain on the relationship. Being late is a selfish act in itself, for it puts your needs above others. You would want extra time to do some of the things you like but in gaining that amount of time, you deprive the other party of his/her time when he/she could have been doing something useful as well. Thus being late is a form of stealing, except the currency is time which cannot be earned back. You might not know the sacrifices someone has made in order to meet you on time. Therefore, always value other people's time as you would to your own. 

I agree that I may not be the most punctual person in the world but I do make it a point to manage my time well and set off early most of the time. This is something that I have been working on and I am glad to say that I am very rarely late.

Late text replies

Okay this depends on the type and nature of text messages. 

As a rough estimate, as long as you do not take more than 12 hours, it should be fine most of the time unless it's really really urgent. That being said, please do not reply late on purpose! :p

I would expect a quick or almost instant reply if it's just an answer to a simple question, like " Are you going for so-and-so event? Do you have this-and-this? " or if the conversation has been relatively flowing to and forth. Otherwise, I usually give this type of messages up to a few hours since the receiver may not have seen it or is busy. I usually reply very quickly, almost instantly if I have nothing much at hand, as some of my friends would attest. I don't like to keep people waiting as it might be urgent. If I do reply you late, it means that I am really busy.

The second type of messages is those whereby there is no specific issue involved, mostly just random chit-chatting. It really depends on the other party's interest and involvement. I am kinda huge on texting I admit. If the content is really interesting and the pace of replies are pretty constant and quick, I usually reciprocate and reply quickly as well. So it would kinda upset me when the other party leaves me hanging there without a reply for several hours or even up to a day when the conversation seems to be going well and smooth. I understand that people may be busy with other commitments but I think it is basic courtesy to inform the other party that you can't reply at the moment with a simple "ttyl (talk to you later)"? Wouldn't that be better? I don't really like it when someone leaves me hanging cold. I would feel that it's either the other party is just not interested anymore or simply couldn't be bothered. I have actually experienced this situation several times before. It was an interesting and engaging conversation initially but after awhile I could sense that the other party replied later and later often. I didn't take it to heart and let it go, replied as swiftly as I usually do. It became tiring and some sort of frustrating because of the waiting time. By then, I simply just wasn't interested in keeping up the pace anymore either.

Okay maybe I am thinking too much, but you sorta get the idea.


Some other pet peeves (minor): 

-people who hog the walkway by walking in the middle and very slowly or walking in groups slowly, seemingly unaware that there are other people who are rushing for time.

-people who don't keep to their promises and don't mean what they say.

-people who suggest doing a certain activity and yet not carry it out, but wait for others to do the organizing. (in the end, no one will do it)

I apologise if this seems like a very long complain post airing my grouses and grievances, feel free to exit the blog and continue with whatever you were doing earlier.

Well feel free to share your pet peeves with me! You might just have the same ones as me ;)

Drifting apart

In life, people come and people go. It is inevitable that people do drift apart. It might not be intentional or anything but sometimes life's like that. We move on. We have our own lives to lead, we meet new people, we get busy with work, we go to different schools, we hardly meet. The act of drifting apart could be really subtle, so subtle that you and the other party may not even notice it, which makes it the more dangerous. 

In any friendship/relationship, it takes the effort of both parties to maintain it. If only one party is putting in the effort, eventually he/she will get tired, frustrated and eventually give up trying. In a relationship/friendship, there is always someone who is putting in more effort than the other, it's hard to avoid this imbalance.

We tend to take things for granted, thinking that it will always be there. 

For example, It could just be the simple act of texting.

In the beginning stages, both parties find texting refreshing and new, they text back and forth several times in a day fairly quickly. It is thrilling and sets your heart thumping, you enjoy it and you look forward to the texts. All is good until one party gets busy, the reply becomes slower. You start to get busy as well but you would still reply as quickly as you can because it means so much to you. Sometimes you wonder if the other pary would do the same. The reality is you might be the only one who cares so much about it. You make the other party your priority but turns out you might only be an option to him/her. You're fine with waiting but as time goes by, the waiting becomes tormenting. You try and comfort yourself that the occasional late reply is probably not intentional. You try to validate the other party's reasons for replying late. As time goes by, the late replies become more and more frequent. In order not to seem too eager, you begin to tone down as well.There is still some texts exchange but it is getting painfully fewer. It falls into a vicious cycle and becomes a dangerous habit, where it just doesn't seem important to reply quickly anymore.You try all means and ways to salvage it, to restore it to when it was before. The reality is, once it's gone, it is never ever going to be the same again.

You start to wonder whether it is worth the effort to keep it up. The sad reality could be that the other party is just not interested anymore but you didn't realise it any sooner. You invested your time and feelings into maintaining this relationship/friendship but sometimes things just don't work out. The emotional turmoil that come with it wears you out. 

Before you know it, there comes the cooling off period. Part of you aches for things to go back to normal. But deep down in your heart, you know that it is just not possible anymore. You miss the old times. You struggle to move on. It is not easy, but you do. Once you get pass it, nothing is ever going to daunt you again. It has made you a more mature and wiser person.


Sometimes I wonder how different things would be if people tried harder or didn't stop trying.

Why teach?

Life has been getting really hectic nowadays, but mostly fulfilling :)

Thank God for opportunity to take up so many things. It is really tiring, I admit I crash and collapse on the bed every single day, but I really want to give thanks to God for letting me learn so much each and every day.

I haven't had much time to practice for my piano mock exam with all my commitments and all but with God's grace, I was able to pass it! I really expected myself to fail actually, so I was really taken by surprise that I managed to pass.

I recently embarked on a teaching internship and it has really been a humbling experience for me. It was an eye-opener for me and allowed me to gain much insight into the education sector. I never knew so much went into the workings of the school. The school is like one huge machinery with so many parts working and functioning together, not just the students and teachers, but so many other support officers who make it possible. I was posted to a neighborhood school and frankly I didn't really have a good impression of the school. However, I was proved to be wrong after spending a few days there. I got to bake muffins with some at-risk kids and interacted with them. Often, we tend to judge people based on their behavior but we never think about why exactly do they behave that way? There are many underlying issues that cause people to act and behave like the way they are. It could be family issues, medical conditions or hardship. The kids go through things that we cannot imagine. Once you go beneath that and understand them more through conversation, you discover that they are actually really wonderful and innocent kids. My heart goes out to them. They're really one of the strongest people I know.

Often, people ask me, why do I go into teaching? There were many people who discouraged me, citing long hours and tough work. I have also heard of stories of teachers who get burnt out. But at the end of the day, I guess every single job has its own difficulties. For me, I have always loved working with young people and enjoyed the satisfaction that came with teaching when people finally understands a certain concept, so teaching was a natural calling. Most of all, as cliche as it may sounds, I wanted to make a difference in the lives of the students that cross my path. I truly believe that it was God's will for me to be a teacher. He wanted me to mold students into characters of substance, to touch their lives in ways unimaginable. Teaching is an exciting profession, not a single day is the same which makes it really challenging and stimulating at the same time. I have had many inspiring and dedicated teachers in the past, which also influenced my decision in becoming a teacher. Teaching is indeed a noble profession and I sincerely salute all the teachers.

I guess those who enter the teaching service with high hopes might be disillusioned when they do not achieve what they set out to do. For me, I might not be able to help all my students, but I do hope I can at least help one. At least it did make a difference in his/her life. I do not know if I will be able to be a good teacher in the future, but I hope that at some point of my career one or another I would have been able to inspire one student to be a teacher too. I think it is always heartwarming to see your own students becoming teachers so that they can pass the beacon of knowledge on. :)

I will leave this post with some food for thought. Presenting to you the starfish story :)