Something to be answered..!

"Personal Blogs - The personal blog, an ongoing diary or commentary by an individual, is the traditional, most common blog. Personal bloggers usually take pride in their blog posts, even if their blog is never read by anyone but them. Blogs often become more than a way to just communicate; they become a way to reflect on life or works of art. Blogging can have a sentimental quality. Few personal blogs rise to fame and the mainstream, but some personal blogs quickly garner an extensive following. A type of personal blog is referred to as "microblogging," which is extremely detailed blogging as it seeks to capture a moment in time. Sites, such as Twitter, allow bloggers to answer one simple question - "what are you doing?" instantaneously with friends and family and is much faster than e-mailing or writing. This form of social media lends to an online generation already too busy to keep in touch. -wikipedia.com"


Blogging enable me to express feeling and my own thought of what i have learned throughout the coursed, my difficulties, my interest, and my mistakes. Everything can be shared and the most interesting is when people were reading the blog and they put me some comments. I love blogging.. Nothing about to say about i do not like blogging. Blogging teaches of patience, willingness to share products and encourage me to think critically. I have to be patience in completing the weekly blog. Everything have to be completed within every week or else it will be overloaded work. Since everyone is able to reading the blog, i have to be willing enough to share and let other read and comment on that. At the same time, it encourage me to think critically while i am doing writing and reflecting on the lesson attended.

I like the course as it really introduce me with something new and give me a new experience of doing things but as a students; sometimes, i feel that there are too much work to be completed within a short time given.. Thinking that i have to be more time conscious.

I learned a lot from the course, especially when it is dealing with technology - photo editing, video editing, audio editing, developing e-book, designing teaching aids for the young learners, evaluating software, and some other things that really captured my interest. All my expactions of the course seemed to be true as i learned what i always want to learn and own the skills.

Nothing to be changed about the course as i love to attend and learn about the topics and skills that are related to the course since i believe that the course will be able to provide a very sophisticated and knowledgeable future teacher.

My Philosophy Of Learning

Yesterday was the day that we were having our final test. everything was going allright.. I started to believe that it was always something that we have to do for ourselves using own effort or else we would be fail to be in the same line with others. No one is going to help for freelance especially when there is no benefits. I would always remind myself about this. But I even still do not very sure whether I am in the same line with others or still walking slowly at the back of others.. It is just a question for me to think about and the answers that i have for that are very important for my own sake.

At the same time, as it have come to an end of the course, people always ask about our belief of what we have achieve. It is nothing much than that. Personally, as we have been developing resources for young learners; step by step, i have build my own philosophy of what learning is all about. I believe that learning is an on going process that never rests; learning occurs anytime and anywhere either we concious about it or not. Everyone learns in his or her own unique way; thus it is important for the teacher to make sure that resources designed for the learners are very flexible for everyone. The learning process can be greatly facilitated through hands-on and real world experiences. With or without technology, everything will be find and full-engagement of the pupils if it involve hands-on and real world experiences. Students learn best through activities that allow them to interact with others and exchange ideas. This is where the role of pair work and group work are really beneficial in the learning process. Learning is facilitated if the students are cooperative and supportive of each other. Students' level of cooperation is based on how the teacher views the learning. Teacher's view of learning will be affected the class as a whole and they are willingly to give commitment toward what teacher is expected them to complete. These my own philosophy of learning will teach me of how to be a better person and educator.

time to be serious..

A lot of work to be done within this two weeks.. I really cannot make up all those works during the previous week because of the Raya Holiday. I haven't started on any of the assignment given but i believe that everything will be allright if i am strictly follow the schedule made.. There is no lesson going on during yesterday class but we were given time to work on our assignments. It is good for the moment since I have finished working on the first material but non of lesson plan. INSYALLAH.. within this week i will make sure everything will be on time. At this time, i should be mentally-readily prepared for the pressure and stress. Learn to work under pressure..

However, i have bumped into this paragraph where there is something that make me think twice..

If you’re waiting until the last minute to complete an assignment because you like that rush you get from being under pressure, and you think that’s when you do your best work, think again. While it may be true that you’ll finish the work quicker because the pressure makes you move faster, is it that you’re finishing the work because you’ve done your best, or are you ending the work because you’ve run out of time? Did you have time to put the finishing touches on it, or did you raise the bar, taking your work to a new level? Probably not. Instead, you threw something together, was satisfied with mediocre, took chances that nothing would go wrong, created a lot of unnecessary stress for yourself, and then plopped down to start procrastinating all over again.
by Peggy Duncan
http://stress.about.com/od/managetimeorganize/a/battlingprocras.htm

Creating Materials for ESL classroom

Last week, my group has presented the topic from the article "Creating materials for ESL classroom". After reading the article, I have come into understanding that it is really important for a teacher to adapt the materials in order to suit the pupils' level of proficiency and learning objectives. At the same time, the articles also highlighted that it is vital for a teacher to really know on how to choose the existing materials that are readily available to be used in the classroom in which can help the teacher to save time, effort, and expenses. At this point, i believe that a teacher does not merely adapt the materials since there are always good reasons for doing adaptation. Adjustment is made to suit pupils’ interest and needs, for example; materials produced for native speakers (first language learners) can be adjusted into non-native speakers (second language learners) where some sentence structures and vocabulary are to be adapted. Besides that, adjustments are needed in terms of glossaries, key words and explanations of language aspects. In addition, I also believe that teachers are doing adaptation in order for the specific use. For instance, teacher may work on a specific context in order to attract pupils’ attention to the grammatical point or language structure when using an authentic language in the classroom. Looking back to the class presentation, we also have included the example of "THE TOMATO" by Prof. Larry M.Lynch. The example make us realize that familiarization is another important elements for a pupil to acquire knowledge and generate their thinking. Plus, the using of familiar materials such as realia (real materials) in the classroom also helps teacher to manipulate the input easily and effectively.

What do I know about newsletter?

From my own understanding and reading, newsletter is a publication that is regularly distributed to the subscibers. Subsribers may be the members of the organizations or someone who is intersted with the content of the newsletter. Generally, newsletter contains one main topic of interest. For example, my group is doing newsletter for the School of Young English Learner and our newsletter is all about English Week.

Other examples of newsletters are newspapers and leaflets. I have read that nowadays, newsletters delivered electronically via email (e-Newsletters) have gained rapid acceptance for the same reasons email in general is gaining popularity over printed correspondence. General attributes of newsletters include news and upcoming events of the related organization.

During the task, I was incharged for the newsletter compilation. Thus, i have to do all the designing parts as well as rearrange and make sure that the newsletter look well-organized and attractive enough for the readers to read. As we are doing for school newsletter, our readers are the school children. At this point, it is very important to choose the contents, fonts, graphic, and colours; in order to ensure the suitability of the readers' interest.

Micheal Jackson the Assignment

I was a bit of confusing with the lesson plan format as was given in the assignment. Thus, i decided to make a full and complete lesson plan. i dont know whether this is accepted or not but by designing a completed lesson plan, it gives me satisfactions of doing this assignment. I have completed the task last night and this morning we are going to recheck each other work where we are going to polish and repair any part that what should be.

Sometimes, I just wondering why should we make the same tutorials that we used to make. I understand that the weekly assignment required us to do the tutorials as we are learning and gaining skills from new software or the software that we never used before. At this time, again, we are required to do the same tutorials that everybody has done before. It seems like the tasks that we are engaging are repeated, apart from the assignment development. Anyway, I believe that the coordinator and assignment desingner have their own objectives and rationales which must be beneficial for everyone and every task.

The Four Skills

Today, I will be handling the “Four Skills” assignment. I have worked on the assignment almost ¾, suddenly I realize that something is going wrong. I have forgotten that the topic for my group is people whereby I was working on topic food. It is my own carelessness and me, myself, really upset about that since I have to do the work twice.. I have to stay up for the rest of the night until sahur. That was the thing that I have to pay due to my own inattention.

Basically, my materials are pictures and video. Pictures downloaded from the internet were being put into video track and a video was developed. I used this video to teach writing. This video is about occupation. The material is able to provide a useful input for the pupils before they start their writing. It means that the pupils are gaining some ideas of how to write descriptions by using appropriate punctuations, nouns, verbs, and sentence structures. At the same time, the pictures and written descriptions in the video work as stimulus for the pupils to activate their schemata of prior knowledge about writing descriptions. Since the video presents the pictures together with the descriptions, I believe that pupils can easily gain understanding. Thus, the role of classroom assessment will be more reliable and useful.

Creating My Own E-BooK

I have bumped into a website that provide a collections of online storybooks for young learners. I have come across a story in the website and found it very intersting. So, i decide to adopt and adapt the story for my e-book project as well as to suit the learning outcomes and curriculum specification that I have chosen. As a continuity, I have downloaded some other pictures and sounds to fit in the story. I started to work on the project until finish line.

Thus,I have completed my e-book. Developing an E-Book is something that can be called interesting. I have developed an e-book for Year 3 pupils under the theme of world of story, entitled "The Adventure Of Fish and Frog". I choose a frog and a fish as the main characters in the story as it is believed that the characters are familiar to young learners. I also included antagonist characters in a small part of the story, in which a large bird stole their lunch. The story is about a short journey of Frog and Fish as they are going to smell a giant flower on the west side, how their lunch had been stolen, and how they helped each other. As usual, there are always moral values. In this story, I presented the young learner with the values of understanding, similarities, differences, patience, helpful and caring. This is very important as examples to them to develop young learners behaviors and attitudes as they are going through the growing process.

Dance Overtiredness To Kampung

Last week was a very exhausting moment. We have to complete the enjoyable task in which turned into the most complicated task..! Our group is the earliest group who handed in the task (thanks to Adila and other group members.). We uploaded in on ADEC but some of the videos are in bad condition even though it was in .avi format. I was asked to change the format even though the format was already in .avi. What does it means?

The night before the date due, since everyone unable to upload the video on ADEC, a representative announced that the video can be burned into a DVD. I did not feel the stress until a group member who was unable to control her emotions vomited her dissatisfaction about all this chaos into me. She may felt relieved after crying and throwing all her frustration in front of me but did she ever considered what I would feel after listening to all this? Did she thought that I would also feel relieve like her? Only god knows…

I was the only group member who was in KL at the moment and I have to do this all alone. Luckily, I have all the materials since a group member had given me the materials before she went back to her hometown. Another group member was helping me online even though she was at kampung (thanks to faizah). In the middle of the night I went to a friend’s house to get the DVD-R and went to 7-E to buy another DVD-R as a back up. I work all night until morning to compile all the materials and tutorials in the DVD. In the early morning, I gave the REQUIRED DVD to a friend (thanks to zima) before going back on the Saturday morning and slept silently along the journey to kampung...

Audio Editting...

Finally, i choose "Because of you by Kelly Clarkson" to be edited. Overall, I use Easy AudioCutter to edit the songs. A housemate gave me another software called "virtual DJ" but it is quite complicated for me to fully use the software. But then, I use a function from "virtual DJ" to change the key in the song.

As a new unprofessional audio editor which also means a greenhorn, i included the word "Cinderella" after the phrase "because of you" to replace the next stanza. The word "cindrerella" was cut from a song entitled "Cinderella" by Radja, a band from Indonesia. In a small tiny addition, I put an opening and closing for the songs. I kept on doing this again and again to make sure that everything sounds as good as I am able to produce. After finish, I listened to the edited version, thought it was synchronize enough, and upload it on the net. Hehe.. I dont know if i have put myself into mistake.

Anyway, I always remind myself not to aspect much for the marks; it is a God job. But I am glad and satisfied since I am able to complete the task and totally have learn something new throughout the week.


"Because Of You"
I will not make the same mistakes that you did
I will not let myself
Cause my heart so much misery
I will not break the way you did,
You fell so hard
I've learned the hard way
To never let it get that far
*
Because of you
I never stray too far from the sidewalk
Because of you
I learned to play on the safe side so I don't get hurt
Because of you
I find it hard to trust not only me, but everyone around me
Because of you
I am afraid
I lose my way
And it's not too long before you point it out
I cannot cry
Because I know that's weakness in your eyes
I'm forced to fake
A smile, a laugh everyday of my life
My heart can't possibly break
When it wasn't even whole to start with
*
I watched you die
I heard you cry every night in your sleep
I was so young
You should have known better than to lean on me
You never thought of anyone else
You just saw your pain
And now I cry in the middle of the night
For the same damn thing
Because of you
I never stray too far from the sidewalk
Because of you
I learned to play on the safe side so I don't get hurt
Because of you
I try my hardest just to forget everything
Because of you
I don't know how to let anyone else in
Because of you
I'm ashamed of my life because it's empty
Because of you
I am afraid
Because of you (2x)

There goes pHoTo Editing, Here comes AuDio EdiTing

Fuh..It is just a luck that i am able to submit the photo on time. Still, I am not satisfied with the product. I complete the task in a rush, without enough equipment. It is own false because of the confusion with the date line. Anyway.. i should do better next time. For audio editing, I have never do this kind of editing. But as a first step to show that i am ready to take the risk I have downloaded the "EasyAudioCutter". Hehehe~
In two days time, lets see what will the result be..!

pHoTo EditiNg aNd E-BoOk

I really want to do photo editing and create E-Book.. And this week lectures touch on that. I have some clear idea but still unable to to things on that since i still don't have the Photoshop. It's ok and be calm. But.. keep reminding that we have to hand in the task by Sunday. oh gosh.. I will think about this later.

In the mean time, my group had discuss about the e-book production. Huda, Mira, Kasthuri, Izuddin and me agreed to come out with a narration based on the topic Glorious Food. Roughly, we have come out with a storyboad that show a the plot of our narration. Some elements such as flashback is also included. Promising, it is a common story yet different.. Haha..

In term of types of application that we want to use in order to develop the e-book, the initial choices are only powerpoint presentation, window movie maker and power director. Using Flash should be very interesting and make the e-book alive and interactive. I have read about it in the Wikipedia..

"Adobe Flash (previously called Shockwave Flash and Macromedia Flash) is a set of multimedia software developed and distributed by Adobe Systems and earlier by Macromedia. Since its introduction in 1996, Flash has become a popular method for adding animation and interactivity to web pages; Flash is commonly used to create animation, advertisements, and various web page components, to integrate video into web pages, and more recently, to develop rich Internet applications.

Flash can manipulate vector and raster graphics and supports bi-directional streaming of audio and video. It contains a scripting language called ActionScript. It is available in most common web browsers and some mobile phones and other electronic devices (using Flash Lite). Several software products, systems, and devices are able to create or display Flash, including the Adobe Flash Player. The Adobe Flash Professional multimedia authoring program is used to create content for the Adobe Engagement Platform, such as web applications, games and movies, and content for mobile phones and other embedded devices."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macromedia_Flash.

In the end, I just wondering if we should take into consideration if the learning outcomes and the Curriculum specification before we develop the e-book. I will go and try to find out on the forum soon..

Children are PURE..

Sometimes, i miss the time when i was in kindergarten and primary school. Everything was so easy and cozy.. Everyone was so fine and well. Nothing much to think and solve. All i need others will prepare it for me. if i could turn back the time. I makes me think back of the old days because of the last lecture.
In a bucket, the lecture was about young learners and how they gain experience and learning. The way they act and respond are really innocent, naive and "pure". As a teacher to be, I have to really consider and understand how young learner grasp meaning. They learn best though their five senses, direct experiences and concrete materials. Thus, abstract concept should be avoided in the early stages of development. This is supported by Piaget Theory. However, it doesn't meant that their imagination are to be blocked. Their imagination is actually developed through interaction with concrete materials. Young learners are making sense of their own world by their own imagination. Materials such as cartoons, art crafts, drawings, and fairy tales are good assistance for young learners in learning language.
I understand that sometimes, young learners have better idea of their own learning. Teachers to be flexible to listen and figure out what are they young learners trying to express. I believe that it is better if young learner are given chances to give their own opinion on what they should be working on. At this point, teacher must always to make sure that the learning are nonthreatening and fun. This will encourage them to practice the language during interaction with others and acquire more vocabulary.
In short, we should keep sense of playfulness and fun during the lesson, thus, activity with too much drill and rote memorization should be avoided. More important, group setting is always effective to encourage interaction among children and enhance their creativity of the language use. Plus, this will instill the children with the curiosity of language.

The first assigment..

The task assigned for this week required us to be in the group of mixed races and gender. At first, everyone seemed to be worried and started promising with each other to be in the same group. However, as we sat in our own group and started discussing with each other, there is none problem at all. I assume that all of us think that there would be a problem when working with other classmate that we are not familiar with, whereas there is no problem at all. This happened because we have never tried to work with another classmate until we are forced to do so. Personally, I am happy with the task and also with the groupmates; Nona, Ah Bak, Zha, Wanjoe, and me.

During these two weeks we are to search and collect the materials for teaching aids for year 5, whether they are animation, pictures, videos, songs, plays, games, or broachers as long as the materials are closely related to the selected topic from CS. At the moment, we have selected unit 12: The Internet as the topic. This is to be carried out together; Nona and Wanjoe are going to do the search, Ah Bak’s job is to do the report of what we have done, while Zha is going to prepare for the tutorial and me is to supervise the work. In this task, I still wonder if I am able to handle my work professionally and make sure that everything will be all right. Beside full cooperation among group members, I believe that time management is the most important part in making sure that the product of the task will be succeed. I am hoping for the smoothness of the work progression.

At the same, I have to start to collect the content of what we have learned throughout the course to be filled in the portfolio. As the starter, I have put a copy of syllabus and curriculum specification for Year 5 in the portfolio and this will continue until the end of the course.

in progress..

This is the first time i do blogging. I do not know of what to be expected and how my blog will look like at the end of the course. Anyway..i hope everything should be full and well-organized as i reach at the end of the course.
This poem shows how i take this blog as my hope:

Do you know what hope is? It's magic and it's free.
It's not in a prescription. It's not in an IV.
It punctuates our laughter. It sparkles in our tears.
It simmers under sorrows. It dissipates our fears.

Do you know what hope is? It's reaching past today.
It's dreaming of tomorrow. It's trying a new way.
It's pushing past impossible. It's pounding on the door.
It's questioning the answer. It's always seeking more.
It's rumors of a break. It's whispers of a cure.
A roller coaster ride. Of remedies, unsure.

Do you know what hope is? It's candy for the soul.
It's perfume for the spirit. To share it makes you whole.
Take my hand...come...
Let's share this hope...together...

http://home.iprimus.com.au/kuekids/hope/poems/message.html