raksha3's Xanga

Thursday, September 22, 2005

Thu, 22 Sep 2005 10:37:18 GMT

Hey studentsJ

Finally the microteaching’s over... It’s not graded but it’s still soooo stressful! But it’s a great learning experience. Really… I feel super-relieved yet satisfiedJ

Well, the class did manage to go somewhat like how I planned it to be, except for some minor hiccups here and there. I did stick to my time as according to the lesson plan and am really happy that the students participated actively. I was a little nervous at first, but I slowly gained confidence as the lesson progressed. One lesson I learnt is to always be armed with a bottle of water. Halfway through the lesson, my throat was really dry. I think that’s when I started stumbling on a few words! Only when the students started to do their quiz did I reach out to my bag to get my bottle! Should have done it earlierJ

I was really lucky that Ken had just taught the lesson on factors affecting industries and it fitted in seamlessly into my lesson. I did not have to spend much time probing the class into answering many questions as the information was still fresh in the minds of many. I should have gotten my hands on a longer video though. It would have really helped to make the lesson more visual. Sadly, no matter how much I searched, this was the best Google had to offer!

A mistake that I made was that I forgot to tell the students to close their books and notes before doing the quiz. I had that on my lesson plan and I still don’t know how I could have forgotten that. Much of the entire lesson was done in a bit of a rush as I wanted to be able to conduct the quiz and time was running out. In a normal class, I would have given students time to look through their notes and books before attempting the quiz. But I decided to just jump into the quiz for our class due to time constraints.

When the question on ‘capital’ was raised, I was not sure what Lily was saying at first. I should have made the term clearer to the students from the start. I had that down in my personal outline that I printed out. But once again, totally forgot while hurrying through the lessonJ

It was a funny situation when Chris asked me about my pay! I was so tempted to tell students the estimated figure and ask them to work harder and get better results so that I could get promoted… Hehehe... Kidding! But this has come up in a class before and I just brushed it away. However, I did once tell the rough figure to my form class during my 6 months in Tanjong Katong. It was during PCCG and we were discussing career development and some students were seriously interested in teaching. Thus when this question came up as part of the career description, I did not see much harm in answeringJ

I made a grave error in class today and I am really sorry. It was the part on Karnataka being Bangalore’s capital. I was a little unsure and had reminded myself many times to check it before class. Once again, it completely ran out of my mind. I just checked up on it a while ago and found out that Bangalore is in the Southern Indian state of Karnataka and not the other way round. Really sorry about this. I would have surely corrected myself the following lesson if this was a real case scenario. I guess these microteaching lessons are really for us to learn, and this is something I’m surely going to keep in mind.

Well, that’s about all. I really wanna thank you all for being great ‘students’.

Cheers,

RakshaJ

Thursday, September 08, 2005

Thu, 08 Sep 2005 12:08:47 GMT

Hey ppl,

Real sorry for not writng for the longest time. Simply have so much to do. I shouldn't be complaining since I’m sure most of you guys have just as much as me… and some even more! Guess I just have super bad time management! Today’s lessons were very different for me. For Mas’s lesson, I was doing the recording and I came in late for Yen Ping’s lesson and created quite a scene due to my ‘carelessness’.

Mas’s Microteaching session

Being behind the camera, I had certain constrains which did not allow me follow the lesson entirely, as compared to if I was to take the role of a student. Nevertheless, I felt that Mas did a great job. Recapping of the previous lesson’s work while they were still standing kind of ‘forced’ students to answer her questions as most of them wanted to sit down. This would really save the teacher the time of having to repeat her questions again and again and asking for students to volunteer for answers.

The idea of bring the rainforest to the classroom absolutely captured the minds of the students. Not only were they curious to see the video, many of them were even jotting down notes and drawing the features of the rainforest. Since mot of the students hadn’t been to the BTNR, this was a great idea of instantly making them aware of their case study. I hadn’t really thought of a virtual field trip before. It is truly a great ideaJ

Mas made clear instructions before handing out worksheets to students and the constant ‘Shhhs’ from her managed to keep the class fairly under control. Pity there was not enough time to complete the lesson. It would have been nice to see how it would have been wrapped up and how the students would have presented.

Yen Ping’s Microteaching session

Yen Ping managed to keep the class absolutely quiet. When I first entered, I was pretty shocked to hear the eerie silence! The case of the lost wallet, I feel, could have been handled better. From a student’s point of view, I was already real upset at the loss of my precious wallet. Instead of showing concern, I was reprimanded for my carelessness. If I could act well, I would have surely burst out into tears. Here I was standing helpless at the utter loss and scolding me did not make things any better.

Kenneth decided to add a twist by asking me to blame someone loudly in the class. I decided to pick Wesley. Once again, I did not see the appropriateness of asking the student to check the belongings of another student. The teacher should have herself checked the bag of spoken to Wesley herself after class.

Apart from class management, Yen Ping’s style of teaching the lesson was done well. By labeling the students, she managed to get us all actively involve and understand the importance of studying grid location with regards to the actual world. She came well prepared with diagrams and charts that allowed us to clearly understand the concepts well.

Cheers,

Raksha

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Wed, 24 Aug 2005 03:47:07 GMT

Dear fellow geograhers,

Hope all's going good with you guys.. The previous microteaching lesson was real interesting! A new twist was added to the learning of volcanoes! I thought it was great what Shou Wee did with the tapioca flour. Never would have I taught of doing that in my class. These microteaching sessions are indeed a great avenue to allow us budding trainee teachers to learn so much more

Shou Wee's Microteaching session 4

Excellent work babe! Seriously, you handled the class well and delivered a great lesson. I felt it was well prepared and activities were exciting yet not too challenging for secondary 1 students who are new to the world of volcanoes. As mentioned in the class, getting the students to draw their impressions of volcanoes allowed the students to easily get into the swing of the lesson. There was a gradual shift from the previous topic to the new one as Shou Wee began her lesson with a fun activity, and did not just simply dive in into a brand new topic. The slides were well done and the lesson was delivered step by step. A great thing that Shou Wee did was to call out the names of different students at specific intervals and ask them if they were following he lesson. This was a excellent method of keeping all students at attention instead of asking the entire class as a whole whereby some students just nod even though they are not very clear. Although the 'noisy' table tried to get most of Shou Wee's attention, she did not focus all her energy on them. This again, was clearly shown as she asked students individually if they understood.

Shou Wee entered the class and instructed the students to put books from any other subject away. This I feel is important so as to allow students to focus all their attention on the teacher and the subject. Cluttered tables do not make a very conducive environment for students to study. Shou Wee went one step ahead by showing the different flows of 'lava' which provided a great closure to the lesson. It would have been nice to see how she would have concluded the lesson. Was a pity we did not have much time. Something that could also be added to the teaching of volcanoes is showing a video. Students always get easily captured by the beauty of the scenery and the vicious outflow of lava. This raises their curiosity in the subject and thus, they are at full attention during the lesson.

Take care and best regards,

Raksha

Friday, August 19, 2005

Fri, 19 Aug 2005 06:42:10 GMT

Greetings one and all..

Its now 2.45pm, and I'm just half way through my miserable five hour break! Sigh Life's so funny sometimes... On thursdays, I have NO breaks, not even 30 minutes to have my lunch. And on friday, I get 5 hours... I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Anyway, what better way to kill time than to blog right. And I should look at the bright side. The excessive amount of free time absolutely compels me to finish up any pending work that I have. And thank God for the computer lab! It's an abosolute blessing for those who own crashed Toshiba laptops, and ya, I still have not heard from them

I'll just sum up my views on the microteaching sessions 2 and 3, both of which I thought were carried out pretty well. Kudos to Liyan and Yizhen The three hours went by easily laughing at he antics of our fellow geographers and re-visiting topics which have been almost forgotten.

Liyan's Microteaching session 2

Karst has always been a tough topic I feel. During JC days, my teacher didn't really cover the topic because Karst was not a compulsory question. We were simply distributed with notes and told to read up on our own. Liyan started her session by distributing worksheets and providing us with rock samples, a resource that I feel is absolutely necessary in the teaching of any mineral rock component. We were allowed to closely examine the sample and jot down our observations. The idea of confiscation our ICs or Ezlink cards was also pretty interesting. However, it may not work well for some students, especially those who do not take public transport or simply don't care if their cards are confiscated. The class, as usual was rowdy and Liyan did seem to be getting a little frustrated at the lack of interest and enthusiasm. A few students were lying down and seemed to be in their own world as the lesson continued. Liyan did plan her class well given hat the slides were interesting (especially the flash files) and she also had answers to questions such as "Singapore got Limestone or not, Cher?". Maybe the topic was a little difficult for secondary 3 students to understand and therefore, there was not a 100% being put in by the students. Nevertheless, Liyan was brave enough to go ahead with a JC topic even though she had the liberty to choose any secondary school topic. Great work on that girl Oh and thanks for the chocolates!

The incident of the flying airplanes ( and just to add, the very first one hit me! Grrr..) did take the class by surprise. I personally felt Liyan could have been more firm with the students involved and should have made them throw their 'work of art' away instead of just scolding them. Due to that, the airplanes still continued to fly, disrupting those who were really trying to concentrate.

Yizhen's Microteaching session 3

Yizhen entered the class armed well with a huge bag and a sweet smile. At first glance, Yizhen seemed like someone who could be easily bullied by the students, given her gentle, demure look. But I was so wrong! She fired the students outright the moment the paper airplanes took their flight. I really liked the way she handled the situation. Firm yet she did not lose her cool. The class was also generally quieter during her lesson. Yizhen however, seemed a little distressed when the asthma incident took place. Personally, I myself would have been a little lost if something like that was to happen to me. What came to mind was my secondary 1 geography class during my 6 month relief teaching days in tanjong Katong Secondary School. One of the male students suddenly started a nose bleed. His whole nose and lower face area was filled with blood! I did not know what to do. Luckily, the boy was very clam and the girl in front passed him a packet of tissue. Thanks to my primary school Red Cross days, I knew that the nose bleeding could be stopped given that the person raise his head. The student tilted his head and gradually, the bleeding stopped. However, that was an excellent lesson for me to learn. It taught me that in terms of health, anything can happen to the students anytime. The teachers, as adults, have the biggest responsibility of the students. Thus, it would be essential to equip oneself with the necessary skills to cope with these sudden occurrances.

Yizhen's lesson on faults was detailed and well explained. A brief introduction allowed students to make a smooth transition into the new topic. The presence of models also made the learning more interactive and the concepts of faulting much clearer. The slides were done well and the lesson was pretty entertaining even though the topic of faults is always categorized by students as 'boring'. Due to the lack of time and camera film roll, I guess Yizhen could not wrap up her lesson. A conclusion would have been an excellent end to her lesson. Great work babe :pleased

Regards,

Raksha

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Wed, 17 Aug 2005 07:34:25 GMT

Hey fellow geographers..

My laptop's still down.. Brought it to the NUS Toshiba care centre ( is that what's it called??) and they did not even get back to me since monday. Finally I gave up waiting for their call and called them earlier today. Sadly, my hard drive has crashed. Poor poor laptop of mine Luckily it's still under warranty. So its gonna take another couple of days to get it back, for them to change the entire hard disk.

Meantime, I'm at my friend's place catching up on the virtual world. Literally fell off the chair when I opened up my inbox.. So much has been happening. The desktop in my house hardly works. Its a super 18th century computer. Hangs non-stop everytime I go online. The Toshiba people better do a good job. Anyway, enough of my whining. My apologies to all for not catching up on your blogs. I promise to be super up-to-date once I get my IT life back into shape. For now, I'll just quickly summarise my thoughts on the podcasting and the microteaching session1.

Podcasting

Hmmm.. that's exactly what I told myself after last thursday's class. And truthfully, that's exactly what I still feel about it. Seriously, its a great thing and I am sure I'll pick it up soon. But seriously, I am pretty lost right now. I'm just so glad we're doing it in groups coz' I'm sure I'd have never be able to do it all by myself. And since the opportunity has been given to us, I really do wanna learn and make myself a little more tech-savvy. I absolutely feel IT captures the attention of pupils in a way that the whiteboard and OHP never could! Using podcast in classes would be completely new, coz' as said before, we are the first bunch of trainees to learn this new technology. But for now, I just wanna take it one step at a time and understand the whole apple/podcast world. Eventually, one day, I do hope I would be using it successfully in my classes:)

Microteaching Session1

Great job Chan Ying. Firstly, bravo for having the courage and will power to go first. I think I would have been stammering in nervousness...haha. But seriously, I though it was a superb idea to use those postcards. I've seen them many times before but never would I have thought of doing that. A+ for creativity Just a few aspects which I feel could have been slightly improved. Highlighting the objective at the start would have given the students a clearer picture of what they were going to do. Some of us were a little confused as where the lesson was bringing us to after sometime. In addition, providing some backgound knowledge on tourism (eg.: domestic/international tourism) would have also given the student a good headstart. Nevertheless, the lesson was very entertaining and I'm sure would manage to capture the ever-restless minds of the students.

I feel Chan Ying cleverly managed to control the little 'war' that broke out between Daphne and Ken. It was a great idea to make them work on their tiny piece of mahjong paper instead of issuing them with a new one. Chan Ying's microteaching lesson also reminded me of what my CT told me during my school experience. Her advice was to make our main practicum lesson (the one which would be assessed on) as interactive as possible to show pupil-to-pupil interaction and the teacher as a facilitator. This I feel was exactly portrayed in Chan Ying's lesson. So good work babe!

Well, gonna end off now. My friend's msn keeps beeping! Better let her take over before she makes a million enemies! Haha..

Regards,

Raksha

Wednesday, August 10, 2005

Wed, 10 Aug 2005 02:59:23 GMT

Hey ppl,

This is my first attempt of writing a blog. Guess its like an online diary rite? A geographical online diary. I'm still miserable over the crash of my laptop, guess I'll eventually get over it. I'm kind of excited about the simulated teaching. Hope all goes well during my lesson though. Well, will keep you guys posted. Till then, take care and enjoy:)

Cheers,

Raksha