Final reflection...

Salam...

I started to know the meaning of blogging when I first enter this resources class. Before this, the internet was just a source of information for me, a place for me to search for information regarding my assignments, and a place for me to search for videos and pictures for my own entertainment. Since we have to do reflection in our blog, it is like a burden for me since I have to put my thinking cap while reflecting of the issues that is being discussed in the classroom. However, the situation is changing now. Blogging is like a place for me to express my thoughts and sharing ideas and views, since there is no other way for me to write freely like this. Besides that, blogging trains me to be more critical and creative in my thinking, and improved my thought processes since the reflection requires me to be more crucial and reflective. Besides that, blogging improve my language skills, especially in the grammar and writing skills. It also improves my command and fluency in English, and this is very good for me as an English teacher as blogging is like a place for me to enhance my language skills. In addition, blogging improved my technology skills, for instance when I give comments to other blogs and decorating my own blog with certain beautiful features.

However, I don’t like blogging in the sense that it is quite difficult to get feedback from the other bloggers. It is like we are just the one who busily writes in the blog, and there is no response regarding what is written there. Besides that, it is quite hard when there is no idea of what is to be written in the blog.

What I like about this course? This course taught me a lot of things, especially regarding the technological skills like audio editing, picture editing, and video editing. All these skills are very useful since we can use it in creating and adapting teaching materials for use in the classroom. This course also exposed me to so many new knowledge, for instance the software that I find very useful for teaching in the classroom. I have improved my technological skill, for instance in editing and manipulating teaching aids available so that I will be resourceful enough in my future teaching. I thing that I didn’t like about this course is the submission of the assignment online, which sometimes I find very difficult and troublesome for some of us who have low internet access or no internet connection at all. The problem will be even more difficult when the assignment is set up during the holiday.

Actually, I didn’t expect that I am going to ‘immerse’ in such a technological world where I have to non-stop blogging, and doing all the technological tasks in order to submit our assignments and tasks. But, this is what I learnt throughout the 14 weeks lesson. In contrast, I expect that I will learn on how to use and develop the teaching aids, like what I have learnt in maktab. But, what is stressed in the teaching is more towards how to use technology in the classroom teaching.

If I can change anything in the course, I am thought of changing the performa of the course. The use of technological materials should be in accordance with the use of non-technological teaching materials. For instance, we should be thought on how to integrate the story available in the textbook into something that is technological. Besides that, the attention for searching and developing resources should not be too focusing towards technological area.

All in all, this course has its own impact towards my own learning. I learn a lot throughout the 14 weeks and there seems lots of improvement in my technological skill, a skill that I am not exposed very much before. I learnt to be more mature in my thinking, and as a teacher trainee, I wish that I will be to apply all the knowledge that I have gained in this course in my future teaching. Thank you.

Test your knowledge...

Salam...

This week is vey ‘intimidating’ for us since we have to sit for the test. Since I have been rarely taking any test since we study in University of Malaya, this paper and pencil test was quite difficult for me. I have not been writing for quite some time, and I cannot imagine how I can sit in the lab answering all the four questions in just two hours time! Alhamdulillah...now the test has passed and this is the time for me to do some reflection regarding the test. All the four questions were quite tough for me, especially the last two questions. The first question requires us to select one of the prominent characteristics of young children and discuss how this quality helps them in the language classroom. It is very crucial for us as ‘teacher to be’ to take note of the characteristics of young learners because they are the one that we going to deal with in the classroom later. This will provide opportunities for teachers to exploit these characteristics for effective teaching and learning activities. Imagine a teacher conducting a lesson in the classroom without knowing anything about his/her students. The teacher will not be able to receive the appropriate feedback from the students since he/she cannot even understand the people that they are dealing with. As we know, children are very unique in their characteristics. Each of them possessed different language background, different personality, different intellectual development, and even different temperament. All of these different qualities have its own effects towards young learners’ ways of acceptance in the classroom. By taking note of all these factors, the teacher may vary his /her method of teaching, which will be a very good step in making the learning process even more effective for students.

The second question is more towards the comparison between traditional and technological teaching aids, which I find very useful for us as teacher to think about. This is because a teacher is not complete without teaching aids, and not all teaching aids are suitable to be used in the classroom. In my opinion, both technological and conventional teaching aids have their own positive and negative sides. Technological teaching aids, for instance PowerPoint may be very good in term of display and layout compare to ordinary slides or display sheet. However, when there is no electric current, we cannot even use the PowerPoint as our teaching materials in the classroom. This is when all the conventional teaching aids are more useful to be used in the lesson. However, I do admit that the use of technological teaching aids are more efficient in today’s’ world of education. Besides saving a lot of time, the effectiveness of the lesson can be increased, for instance by using Smartboard which can increase the level of interactivity of the lesson. Therefore, it is important for teachers to use materials that can support learning and create a productive environment for students.

The third question is more challenging in the sense that we are asked to write a summary of a story suitable to be used in the primary classroom, and then prepare a storyboard for the story’s use in the animation video. As we know, children love stories. Using stories as teaching aids in the classroom may create a fun, enjoyable learning environment. Besides that, there are many activities which can be developed by the teacher when using stories, for instance role play and dramatisation. This integration of authentic materials in the classroom will create a safe learning environment, as this is a good way to use real life application in the teaching. The storyboard actually train me to be more creative, as I have to plot the story according to its sequence, drawing some pictures of the characters and scene, besides inserting dialogue in it.

The last question requires us to evaluate the activity given and state the mental and emotional engagement that will be used by students in the activity. This kind of evaluation trains me to be more critical and creative in my thinking, because I need to know what are the mental and emotional engagement that involved throughout the activity. Evaluation is a very important point in teaching as it enables teacher to choose which activity is more appropriate for students. Without evaluating skill, the teacher may wrongly choose an activity, and this will affect the performance of the students.

All in all, this test really urge me to put my thinking cap as a teacher trainee and I hope that we are able to apply all the knowledge that we obtain throughout the lesson in our future teaching.

Children software

Salam...

There is no lecture at all for today, but all of us have been introduced to another useful resource for classroom teaching, which is children software. The software is in the form of children games and I find that it is very practical for teachers because of some reasons.

First of all, the use of this software varies the teaching aids available for students, which will show some difference during teaching and learning. Apart of using typical chalk and talk method, children software will be one of the best alternative that give both teachers and students its own benefits. As we know, children are always associated with games. It may sound very weird to hear a child who does not like to play games. Besides, today’s technological world which exposed students to variety of online, challenging games has maybe become the initiative for educators to insert it into the field of education. Since games are very common among children, this children software will be a good choice for teachers to enhance the effectiveness of teaching and learning in the classroom because it is familiar to them. As we know, one of the basic principles in choosing teaching aids in the classroom is the familiarity of students with the teaching aids, as this will make it easy for teacher to instruct students during the classroom activities.

In addition, the use of children software will somehow create a safe, non-threatening learning environment. Why? This is because children software contains games that suits with students’ interest. A positive learning environment will ultimately enhance the effectiveness of teaching and learning process. Imagine the effects of a dull, boring, or threatening class towards children. They are not prepared to receive the input from the teacher. As the result, the objective of the lesson will not be achieved, and the lesson may just become such a waste. This situation is in accordance with one of the hypotheses proposed by Krashen in his Monitor Model, which is the affective filter hypothesis. It has been said that a positive learning environment will low the affective filter, which will then motivate students to learn and accept the input given by their teacher. In contrast, a negative learning environment will increase the affective filter, which may block students’ acceptance towards the input given by the teacher.

Last but not least, this children software has the ability to increase students’ critical and creative thinking skills. We can see these through the way the students have to finish the game. Since this children software is for educational purposes, many elements of thinking and problem solving has been integrated in it. For example, the software Freddie Fish requires students to find the person who disguise as a ghost who try to scare students from coming to school. Using the clues given, students really need to be observant and critical in solving the case, so that they can finish the game. Hence, we can see that a game can also be a good tool for teacher to enhance students’ thinking skills, and this is really meaningful as it was done in a positive learning environment.

In short, children software offers many positive points for both teacher and students. Teacher need to choose the appropriate stage to implement this software, by considering its relevance and suitability with the lesson.

Being a good planner...

Salam...

The class for today was quite ‘gloomy’, since all the Muslims are still in Hari Raya mood. The most important thing that keeps tapping my head is the assignment. I am still planning what to teach for the lesson plan and it seemed quite unreasonable to say so because it should be handed in next week. But, we cannot put the blame to anyone since we really got abundance of task to be completed lately, in addition with the Hari Raya celebration. Since most of us are still in the process of planning and searching for teaching resources, Puan Foziah has given this class time for us to prepare, continue, and do whatever that we can in order to complete this last, tough assignment. In addition, we has been given a golden opportunity to ask any questions to Puan Foziah regarding our assignment, and there has been quite numbers of us approaching her in order to clarify or get more explanation regarding the assignment.

Since this assignment is the toughest among the all, I really has to put more effort and the brain of a teacher inside my head so that I will manage to complete the task successfully. Besides that, this assignment is challenging in the sense that it test our wisdom in applying all the technological skills that we have learnt throughout the eleventh week in the process of producing the teaching aids for the lesson plan. Skills like picture editing, video editing, and audio editing are some of the fundamental needs that we need to acquire in order to produce a better, practical teaching aids that will help us as the teacher to achieve the objective of our lesson. All this skills cannot be acquired at the same time, (especially for me), hence I need to practice using this skill consistently so that I will manage to explore and improve my skills in it. I am now realize to important of acquiring all this editing skills since most of the teaching resources available in the internet sometimes not suit with the lesson that we want to teach. Why? The most basic reason is because of the target group itself. The uniqueness of young learners especially in their cognitive ability, learning style and attention span required a teacher to be more sensitive in selecting teaching materials in the classroom. We don’t want the real purpose of using teaching aids which is to support the learning in the classroom being distracted by the ignorance of a teacher in suiting the teaching materials with the learners’ needs. Therefore, a good teacher must be the one who are sensitive enough with the learners’ characteristics and are equipped with essential knowledge on how to modify the available teaching aids around them in order to pitch at the right level with the learners’ needs and abilities. There is no need to use such an outstanding, marvelous teaching aids which will add more confusion to students. Be simple and practical in our teaching.

In addition, I really feel that this resources class was a training centre for us as a ‘teacher to be’ to equipped ourselves with all the skills that I have mentioned above so that it will not be a big problem to us when we start our teaching practice next two semester. This assignment is really tough for me, but when it requires me to think a lot, reflect on what I have learnt in the classroom and apply the knowledge into real action, there is a sense of worthiness since it is like a practical work for me as a teacher-trainee who sometimes forget that being a teacher is not just a matter of teaching in the class, but there are many factors to be considered in order to produce a quality teaching.

research analysis

Salam...

The lecture was started by the explanation of the new task for the week by Puan Foziah. For this week, we were asked to search for two research materials regarding the use of teaching aids in the classroom. After that, we were required to do the analysis for each research and fill in the main points required in a table provided. Many researches and analysis has been conducted due to the significant of using teaching aids in the classroom. This replicate the importance or the impact of using this kind of teaching materials in the classroom, as it offers numerous benefits for both teacher and student in the classroom teaching. Imagine a teacher standing in front of the classroom, using a conventional ‘talk and chalk’ kind of teaching for more than one hour, without any assistant of teaching aids. Primary school children will be the victim of this inconsiderable, unethical work of the teacher since they have short attention span. The problem of misunderstanding, confusion and others will always arise since the teacher was not trying to vary his/ her method of teaching and cater for different learner preferences so as to maintain the students’ interest in the classroom

As we know, language teaching is indispensable for the all-round development of a child. The language teacher therefore plays a major role in the language development of a child. To achieve efficiency in language teaching, a teacher should have mastery level of all the language skills and also the ‘art’ of how to use this knowledge in teaching. One of the fundamental items is knowing how to integrate teaching aids in the classroom.Teaching aids are one of the basic components in the teaching- learning process. An efficient teacher is always one who makes maximum utilisation of these teaching aids while executing his work inside and outside the classroom. But it is found out that most of the time teachers use only the text book and no additional or supplementary teaching aids are made use of. It is a glaring fact that even trained teachers seem to give least attention to this need. This has therefore resulted in the low achievement of students, especially those coming from rural and interior areas of the state. There might be a number of reasons that have led to the non-utilisation of aids while teaching. It could be due to non -availability of the materials or lack of creativeness on the part of the teacher.

In my opinion, this kind of task exposed us to the real world of how researches view the use of teaching aids in the classroom. The findings within the research offer lots of input and new knowledge to me as a ‘teacher to be’ as it provides information of the real cases that was happening around the world. The analysis trained me to be more critical in reviewing academic journal, hence increasing my critical and creative thinking skill. The main points gathered from the research were undeniably useful for my future learning in this education field as it contains useful information that intended to increase the effectiveness of using teaching aids in the classroom.

The last assignment

Salam...

Yesterday class was such a relief for me since I have submitted my second assignment. This assessing and manipulating assignment has taught me many things. I learnt that by just using a simple, suitable video, we can manipulate it for use in classroom teaching. The exploitation of these two video clips has been able to develop my creativity and ability to think critically, as I need to consider numbers of things during the production stage. The need of young learners, the suitability of new developing materials, the time allocation and many more are some factors need to be considered by me while I am completing this assignment with my partner. Although more focus is given to the production of new developing materials, we cannot deny that some attention needs to be given to the suitability of our activity with the primary ESL classroom. Since young learners are very unique, we as ‘teacher to be’ need to immerse into their thoughts and come out with activities that match with their interest ad preferences.

In addition, there are also some new tasks given by Puan Foziah, for instance making a collage, wallpapers and using Microsoft Publishers to create business cards, newsletter, pamphlets and brochure. Although these were not a compulsory task for us, we are advised to try out and create something new so that we can put it in our portfolio. There will be extra mark for all this and I cannot just let it go since it affecting the marks for the portfolio and our whole presentation. Even though this task was quite a lot for me, I will try to spend my time wisely to explore this software since I find it very useful in producing new materials or teaching aids for teaching in the classroom, especially to attract students to experiment with the language.

Furthermore, we also receive our next assignment, which is the toughest among the all. Each of us is assigned to create four lesson plans, including all the four basic skills for a-week- teaching in the classroom based on the topic that we get. The due date is after the Raya and now is the time for me to carefully plan the lesson for a week. I feel like this is like my ‘teaching practice’, since the duration is quite long (one week) and there need to be continuation from one lesson to another. However, I will try to try my best and put more effort and thoughts for this assignment.

Portfolio...

Salam...

The lecture begins with a clear-cut explanation of the performa of this course, besides some explanation regarding our last, challenging assignment which is the portfolio. In my opinion, there are many advantages of doing portfolio, and I realised this after we have been exposed to it in our assessment class. As one type of formal assesment, portfolio has many positive sides as it records the piece of work done by the students in a systematic, chronological order. Besides providing information for teachers regarding students’ progress, portfolio trains students to be more systematic and responsible for their own learning. All the work done must be kept systematically following the dates and students has to be professional in arranging the content of the portfolio. There will be certain guidelines provided by the teachers regarding the arrangement of the content, and students need to follow the instruction in order to obtain high marks for the portfolio. In addition, portfolio also offers benefits to parents, as they will be informed about their children’s classroom activity and progression for a period of time. Looking at my context as university students, the portfolio is like a training for me to be more organised and systematic in doing all my work.

Besides that, there is also presentation of the task that has been set for us last week. Every group were asked to send their representative to present their product of discussion. The presentation trains us to select the most important points to be presented in front, and this is very helpful when we want to prepare for our exam, in which we have to select the main points for each subject learnt. The input gained for this presentation was very useful for our future teaching, since it is closely related with course book and teaching.

Discussion...

Salam...

Today's class seemed so short since Puan Foziah didn't enter the class. Initially, there has been subnission of the e-book assignment. All the tiring work seemed worthwhile when we sent the assignment to the representative of the class. This assignment actually challenge our skill in producing teaching aids that are interactive for students, besides sharpening our skill in using technology skill in preparing teaching aids for primary classroom.

After the handing in of the assignment, we received our second task, which require us to form a group of four and produce a simple learning activity that involves all four basic main skills, which are reading, listening, speaking and writing. Sincerely, this task was given quite abruptly to us, since we already have an assignment to be completed in a week time. Hence, I really need to manage my time since the due date of both tasks are close to each other. However, I do admit that this task has its own advantage, since it is like an extra training for us before we start the assignment. Fortunately, this task will be completed as a group work and this provides opportunities for us to practice all the technology skills , for instance internet skill, video editing and many more that I have learnt during the previous weeks. In addition, the way all the four skills inserted in one task gave us opportunity to use our creativity and comment on each others’ work. It also provides us opportunity to vary our scope of teaching, since all the four skills were integrated into one task.

Besides that, we also got another group task, which required us to prepare a power point presentation based on the text that we get for the day. ‘Working with the course book’ was the title of the text that we get for the discussion. Since the text was quite long, we have decided to divide the text into parts, so while the others are internalizing it, someone will be preparing the power point presentation. From the text, I got to know that course book offers many advantages in the classroom teaching. Besides served as the basis for the syllabus taught in the classroom, it can be a good reference for both teacher and students. However, we need to be aware not to be too dependent towards course book, as teacher is the real manager of the classroom. Teacher can enhance the use of the course book by guiding students along the learning process, and not just let the course book dominates the class.

Assignment...assignments...

Salam...

The lecture for today was started by the display of samples of e-book presentation by Puan Foziah, and this help us a lot in completing our next task, which is the preparation of e-book for use in the classroom. After watching all the presentations, I notice the importance of inculcating certain items or criteria along the process, especially regarding the target group which is the students itself. The integration of song, one of the prominent feature in each presentations shows how the 'power' of song in making the presentation a good one. Song usually contains repetition which is very much useful language learning. Besides that, the use of colourful picture, big fonts and animation are very useful in attracting students' attention in the classroom. Hence, I need to be aware of the needs of children in completing this e-book presentation. As a result, the objectives of the learning will be achieved.

In addition, Pn. Foziah also introduced to use two new softwares which are Blumentals and GICKR. Both are very useful in creating animation pictures, and this is a very good opportunity for me to explore and integrate this animation in my e-book presentation. This will make my presentation even more attractive and 'alive', and sustaining students' interest along the teaching and learning process.

After giving enough guidance in preparing the e-book presentation, the discussion was changed into the portfolio part. We were advised to start collecting all the documents, files, and folders as this will avoid the last minute work, and I can feel the 'heat' of burdening with lots of assignments is getting close and close to me. Hence, it is the right time for me to start organise my data so that it will be easy for me to compile all the files needed in the portfolio.

Furthermore, we also received the second assignment, which is assessing and manipulating videos for the ESL classroom. This assignment is quite complicated, since there were numbers of tasks to complete in this assignment. Starting from downloading the video clips ( Michael Jackson ; The Earth Song, we have to convert it into audio files, and taken pictures from the video. Then, we have to create a lesson using all this resources and come out with our own teaching aids. Next, we have to choose our own video from the internet and do the same process as in the first one. This is very challenging for me since a lot of thinking has to be put in this assignment. Besides that, I need to consider the teaching point in this assignment, since there is a demand to refer to the CS and integrated it in the lesson. So, a lot of thinking cap has to be put on and there is an urge to always be aware with the need of young learners, since they are the target group for the lesson. The lesson created must be interesting, attractive, and astounding so as to adapt with young learners special characteristics, so that the objective of the lesson will be achieved. Therefore, this is a good stage for us as 'teacher to be' to make use of our skills in creating a good product for this assignment.

VIDEO EDITING

Salam...

After we have been exposed to audio editing and picture editing techniques, this week’s class was more focusing on the video editing. In short, there were three main methods in producing our own video, which were using pictures, edited videos, and professionally video commercial. Most of us prefer to choose pictures for our coming assignment, in which we have to create our own video in pairs. This is because of the originality of ideas, which can be seen when we selecting the most suitable pictures to match with our theme and concept. Pn Foziah already stressed that this task was not the educational one, and this is like a golden opportunity for me to widen my scope of concept, in which more space of creativity can be put in. The most important thing in making video is the message. The video can be said successful if the message is conveyed to the viewer and appeal to their heart. There is no point of creating such a wonderful, eye-catching video when the message is not clear or blur to the viewers. Since both of us were nature-lovers, we have agreed to choose the concept of nature as the essence in our video clip.

Besides that, Pn Foziah also displayed the video made by two pairs of my senior, and I really astonished on the way they creatively use pictures in making the video. One video is about friendship, and another one is about life. Moreover, I can see how my senior applied the picture editing and audio editing techniques in producing both videos. Although this task was quite easy, a good plan is needed along the video-making process, so that a clear message may be conveyed to the viewers. Software like Cyberlink Power Director and Windows Movie Maker will be very much practical to be used in this assignment.

In addition, we also received another task which is video-editing assignment, in which we have to edit one of the most high-rated television programme on 8tv, which is ‘So you think you can dance’ in group of five. Two main techniques were stressed here, and they were joining and splitting techniques. Besides that, we have to just choose parts in the episodes that show the dance, joining them, and label them according to the specific dancers. This task was quite hard for us since the holiday is so near and the due was during the holiday. However, I and my group will try our best to finish this video editing assignment.

Audio editing

Salam...

There were two main focus for the class today, which were the presentation on identifying priorities in young learners language acquisition and a short lecture on audio editing task. As we know, it is crucial to create a learning atmosphere that integrates real language use in various forms for young learners, since it will be very much helpful in their future language application. Teacher should always aware with the content and attitude goals in teaching, since attitude goal was sometimes being overlooked by teacher due to the exam-oriented setting in Malaysia. Teachers were more focusing on finishing the syllabus and the content of the subject taught, rather than focusing on enhancing students' risk taking attitude and confidence (attitude goal). This is vibrant especially in higher level of education, where the attitude goal was sometimes being ignored by most of the educators.

Besides that, there is a need to understand the nature of language. Children use language to communicate their needs, so it is important for teachers to create a meaningful learning, in which real communication take place. The attitude goals like confidence and risk taking is very important as it was the key part of the process of language development. Besides that, the teacher needs to be aware with nonverbal behaviour shown by students in the class, since it sometimes indicates the understanding by students, and not just focusing on the verbal part. We can see many advantages of real language use in classroom, for instance in encouraging them to predict meaning of words and confirming that language is something that is for real use in their daily life. When students realise the importance of language in their daily life, the learning process will become even easier and positive for them. This will enhance their motivation in learning and lower down the affective filter that may block learning from taking place. In conclusion, learning need to be real and teacher has to balance the attitude and content goals in learning.

After the presentation by each group, we were given a brief description on audio editing by Pn. Foziah. Audio editing was important since it provides opportunities for teacher to edit the audio material that he/she want to use/omit in the class, especially for listening skills part. We can cut, add, or make the sound clear by using software like Audacity, Riva encoder, and many more.Besides that, we also get the opportunity to hear to the song edited by Puan Foziah, and this give a clearer view of what we have to do for the coming task.

4th WEEK LECTURE...

Salam...


Todays' lecture was more focusing on photo editing. Since it is a relieved to know that we are not going to submit the 2nd assignment today, I feel more spirited to learn this topic. Besides that, the lecture was very important to be implemented in our coming assignment, in which we have to create e-book for learning in the classroom. Starting from basic photo editing, we were moving towards the advanced photo editing (which we actually have to study on ourself last week), which I found very helpful and interesting to be implemented when we want to use pictures as our teaching aids in the classroom. I also got to know that there were quite numbers of photo editing software available in the internet, for instance Adobe Photoshop and CorelDraw.It can be downloaded freely and I cannot wait to explore this kind of technology after watching how Puan Foziah manage to edit an ordinary picture until it become such an extraordinary picture for use in the classroom. For instance, we can change the background of the picture, remove the red-eye effects, crop the picture that we don't want, add the sky, and many other changes that can be done by just clicking the mouse.

How photo editing can be very useful in classroom teaching? Imagine a teacher bringing a blur, distort picture into the classroom for use in teaching English. The students will be confused, hence creating a threatening and uncomfortable atmosphere in the classroom. They will not fully understand what is taught in front, and learning become just a waste of time. As we know, young learners are mostly visual learners, which means that they are more attracted to pictures and images while learning, and learning will become more meaningful if the materials used are clear to them. If the teacher used such a blur picture like I describe above, the learning process will be disturbed and the objective of the lesson will not be achieved.

Hence, I can see now the importance of photo editing skill for teachers who would like to integrate technology in their teaching, so that the integrated technology will be exploited at its maximum level. 'Picture worth thousand words' , and it depends on the competency of the teacher to manipulate it for the reason of education in classroom setting.

A FOCUS ON CHILDREN CHARACTERISTICS...

This was the third week for the lecture and photo editing was one of the focus in the classroom. 'A picture worth thousand words'. This expression depicts that even a single picture may tell or describe you a lot of things, and the message brought through the picture may be differently interpreted among different people. Hence, it is very important for teachers to choose a picture that is suitable to be displayed in the classroom, considering its size, colour, brightness and others as this will influence the atmosphere and the acceptance of students towards the classroom activities. Since children were very attracted to colourful pictures, it is like a must for teachers to apply the skill of photo editing in the classroom, especially if the picture was taken from the internet, since not all pictures available in the internet are suitable for student viewing. Pn Foziah told us that there were numbers of tutorials and software downloads available in the internet, for instance using grafix_design.com and online photo edit, for instance fotoflexer.com and mypicasa.com. Although this was a bit complicated to me, I cannot wait to explore the beauty of photo editing, since it sounds qiute interesting and really useful for future use in my assignment.

In addition, the lecture for this week was also focusing on young learners characteristics and how the working process with them will take place. As we know, young learners were very unique. It was not easy to work with them and due to their special characteristics, many educators and researchers has spent a lot of their time in discovering the uniquness of young learners, so that the teacher may apply the best teaching method in the classroom to suit with their needs.

Working with young learners require knowledge of their ability to grasp meaning, creative use of limited language resources, capacity for indirect learning, instinct for play and fun, the role of imagination, and the instinct for interaction and talk. The discussion on all this criteria has been done through group presentation, and all of us get to know all the criteria clearly and in details, since Puan Foziah asked us to simplify the notes given to each group. For instance, in my group presentation, I get to know in details about children's capacity for indirect learning, and as teacher, it is a must for me to balance the indirect and direct learning, which can be done through real task activity. One of the best example is using games, in which both direct and indirect learning may work at the same time. In conclusion, the variety and complexity of children's characteristics required teachers to be well-equipped with skills and knowledge in order to achieve the aims and objectives of the lesson.

2nd ASSIGNMENT...

Since we have been given the second assignment, the second lecture were more focusing on the details of this assignment. This assignment required us to download any useful resources that can be found in the internet for use in teaching in the classroom. First of all, we were given the chance to choose our own group members for this assignment. Although there has been a little chaos in choosing our group members, I cannot deny the fact that the way Puan Foziah grouping us has its own benefits. Different races, different gender were all mixed up in one group in order to create the opportunities for a wider interaction between us, besides avoiding the tradition of 'same race' group or 'same gender' group.

Besides that, it is a must for us to tie every lesson that we plan to teach with curriculum specification (CS), especially Year 5 CS. Why curriculum specification is very important for teachers? This is because it is like a guidance or the blueprint that guide teacher throughout the lesson. Imagine a teacher who came into the class and teach without referring to the CS for the lesson plan. There will be no standardization in the content of the lesson between each school, and this will lead into a big problem when it came to public exam like UPSR and PMR. The validity and reliability of the question will be questioned by many parties, especially the parents.

Besides that, there will be a high tendency for teacher to insert the element of biasness and sensitive issue for instance issue like politics, religions and gender if they are not using CS in their teaching. It may be done unintentionally, but the impact of this mistake can be very serious towards the personality of the students. As we know, children easily absorb and learn on what is happening around them. As the result, they may turn out to be very prejudice towards certain things that they are not suppose to. Hence, I can see the importance of maximizing the use of CS in our teaching and as'teacher to be' ,this assignment is like an eye opener and a training for me towards the core business of teaching that required big responsibilities of the teacher in achieving the aims and inspirations of the National Philosophy of Education, for instance in producing a balanced, harmonious citizen of Malaysia.

Some may said that CS block teachers from becoming creative in their delivery. In my opinion, this statement is not true since CS is just use for guiding teachers and giving them the standard way of content. So, it depends on the teacher on how he/she manipulates the materials available in order to achieve the Learning Outcome (LO) stated in the CS.
In addition, Pn Foziah also displayed the example of tutorial task made by her, which giving us a clearer view on what we actually have to do for the task. Although it looked simple, the ability to use technology for instance video editing is very important since it is very helpful in producing a good resource for students.

Furthermore, in order to help us for this assignment, there has been a little discussion on the software that are available for downloading and encoding, for instance keepvid.com, Daemon tools and others. I found that this discusssion is very helpful since it provide assistance for those who are not really familiar with all this software, besides giving wider choices for us in adapting the material.Lastly was the brainstorm session from each group members on the planning of the assignment. Although this task was quite tough for me, it taught me to be more dependent and resourceful, since it demands a great amount of consideration on the behalf of students' needs and the application of technology itself.

FIRST LECTURE...

Salam...
Unexpected... that was the first word that pop up in my mind after the first lecture last two weeks. At first, I thought that this class is just about using and developing the resources given by the lecturer in the classroom. Since we have been exposed to this subject by our previous lecturer in IPIK, I never expected that this subject will mainly focusing on how we as teachers 'manipulating' the advancement of technology in using and developing the resources for the ESL classroom. This is because in IPIK, the tradition of being dependent towards the lecturer was very dominant, and most of the teaching materials were provided by the lecturer.
Puan Foziah, our lecturer for this subject is very knowledgeable about all this technology stuff. I am very impressed because looking at her age, I wonder how much time that she took to learn and master all the soft skills and those technological stuff. However, I can see her determination in teaching us, and I notice that her strictness somewhow taught me to be more discipline and systematic in my work. Hence, It is my hope to be able to cooperate and work together with my lecturer so that a conducive, encouraging learning environment will be created.
Besides that, I realised the importance of being an independent learner, and as undergraduate university students, it is a must for me to be able to stand on my own feet and become a productive learner, with less dependent towards others. Hence, this subject is like a platform for me to become as such, since it requires me to find my own teaching resources through the internet, and developing it for use in the classroom. Besides, this subject also taught me to be practical and concerned with the needs of young learners, since not all materials available in the internet can be used in the classroom. I have to 'filter' up certain teaching materials and this task is not easy to be done. I have to explore and learn the soft skills like downloading, video editing, converting files and many of other technological stuff that sometime I have never heard before. This course is very challenging for this semester and I hope that I can cope and learn something useful for the betterment of the students in Malaysian context. Why Malaysia? This is because the application of technology was not yet well spread or practiced among school teachers. Although not all school are well equipped with laptops and LCD, we can see that there are many schools which didn't maximise the use of technology although they are well equipped with computer lab, media room, and others. The use of technology is just limited to movie viewing and video watching. Therefore, it is my responsibility as 'teacher to be' to maximise the use of technology in the classroom so as to optimize the students' potential and educating them in a more creative environment in the classroom.