ICELT 2015

My proposal on my latest work on project based learning is now listed and I will be sharing the wonders that my students did through their English language projects. PBL is my latest research interest and will be incorporating it with the latest buzz word HOTS and 21st century skills. I will be sharing successful low - tech, high - tech and no - tech projects that I carried out with my students... I love it and they love it even more....you want to know why...??? Not so soon...do come for my session and you will learn a large deal......

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SPM - Continuous Writing

As a teacher whenever I grade my students' compositions and return to them, the questions that I get will be " Why do I get a C or D but almost all my sentences are correct?" How do you tackle this issue with your students? 

Well as for me I will always look for concrete sentences in order to give an A or B for any particular essay. So how do we show to our students how does concrete and abstract sentences look like? Here is one simple activity which has worked very well in my Continous Writing Introductory Lessons to show high proficiency students the types of sentences that they should construct in their compositions  in order to get A besides having idioms and proverbs... please click here to download them. 

Hard Work Paid Off - GC DG48

I was first appointed as GC in 2010 and ever since then there was no turning back.  I know I have to keep working and working to keep my self abreast of  whatever things that was happening around me. So what did I do to become a GC DG48 ? Here are a few simple things that I did and worked well with me :

a) Firstly I did a lot of sharing and documented them...How did I do my sharing...well through this blog...Well my online sharing did not just reach people in Malaysia but also from other neighbouring countries. I have received emails complementing all my work. That was an added advantage that went directly into my professional portfolio.

b) Secondly as a GC you have to always be innovative.. However your innovation should have received some recognition at least at the district level. Therefore, I did a lot of homework on innovation in ESL and came up with "Wheels of English" which I presented at MELTA Conference 2012 and rebranded it in Perak Innovative Teacher Competition 2014 which earned me a Bronze Award.

c) The most important thing as a GC is your performance as a teacher in classroom. No matter how many innovative and creative method you use, at the end of the day the evaluation will be based on your students' performance. Therefore, I made sure that my students do well in the public examination, it is not about getting As but it is all about improving from one level to another. Ever since I became a GC I  made sure that I am given the weakest classes to prove my worth as a GC. Teaching the 'weaklings' is challenging but also a rewarding experience. I have taken up weak classes and recorded their performance in every examination and filed them. I had a few who failed in the public examinations and could not make it 100% pass...but that was due to students failure to attend school (I had some students who did not come to school for a whole year but turned up during SPM examinations).

d) Well how I  made my weak students pass? first I identified their weaknesses and I created modules that will help them,,, trust me, textbooks and workbooks in the market do not cater to the needs of the weak students. Thus far, I have created about 35 modules, which I have used with different level of students. All the modules were used at school. My modules are not just modules, they were created with purposes. they come with objectives and the before and after use report with photographic evidence to show as a prove that the modules really work in certain circumstances.

e) I have also had my trial - and - errors in teaching. I have practiced various interesting teaching methods throughout the years and improvise them every now and then as preparation for the big day - the teaching and learning observation session. You have to really make an impressive lesson and make sure that objectives are achieved at the end of the day. The lesson must be interactive, interesting, hands - on as well as techno friendly and also you should prove that learning is taking place. Therefore, you should really look for ideas and practice them in your classrooms while improvising them...you do not want to mess up during your classroom observation don't you?

f) Some of my successful lessons were made into research topics and I wrote extensively about them and got them published in two jurnals one in Malaysia and another in Australia. I have also presented my work in various conferences such as ASIA - TEFL Conference 2014, MICELT 2013, ICELT 2014, MELTA 2012 and MELTA 2014 and I will be presenting again at ICELT 2015. Please be there!!

f) Having a good rapport with everyone at school is also important, because when the 'nazirs' visit you at school they will randomly pick some teachers and students for a private interview. Besides, the principal and seniors assistants will be interviewed too. Till today, I do not know what my teachers and students told the 'nazirs' during their visit.

g) Besides, creating modules, as a GC I also shared some of my work through publications. I decided to write in an academic magazine called 'Wadah Siswa' which I managed to write for 12 publications.

h) grade students work appropriately.....It may be time consuming....but the way you mark your students exercise books reflects you....

i) I have always believe in GOD and Hinduism has taught me to stay humble...Therefore I believe that being humble and accepting criticism will take you a long way....

My Last Day in RMS

My ten weeks internship at Riverside Middle School came to an end last week. It was a journey of learning experience as a teacher.  Throughout my internship, I came across many new teaching ideas and classroom practices that I value more than anything. I have to thank my teacher partner, Ms. Sharon Barnette who has 27 years of teaching experience. It was a bless to be partnered with her as she has been very open and understanding. We shared a lot of things during the 10 weeks of internship. Miss Barnette has always been very supportive and encouraging. She gave me the freedom to get thing done in my way and conduct the lessons in my own style. She never once stopped me from doing all the things that I wanted to do in RMS. Our relationship became so close that I almost shed tears when she gave me a hug before I leave the school for good.

As for the students, throughout my internship I realized that kids are kids no matter where you are. Students in RMS are not exceptional. They have the same cheekiness that our Malaysian students have. I did not see the difference in students’ conduct when I compared them to our Malaysian students. However I find that students in South Carolina especially those who are in RMS are very respectful. Well the way they see respectful here is not the formal greetings and wishings but they way students bring themselves. Students here are more casual in greeting their teachers which I really like ( I think I have blogged about this before). On the  last day,  we spent a few minutes together after the end of every lesson taking pictures.

Well, one of my friends said that…we started without any problems and had a smooth sailing throughout the internship and it is good that we leave when the sail is smooth rather than leaving when there is a thunderstorm… all’s well ends well…

He Had Such Quiet Eyes

Hi, I have made this online learning resource for You had Such Quiet Eyes. Are you interested in creating online learning tool like this for your student?? go to http://magic.piktochart.com

Eat, Laugh and Love - Celebrating The Year of Ram Internationally.....

The year of Ram 2015 has definitely brought smiles on the faces of my International friends as I had the privilege to host a Chinese New Year party for them along with my two other crazy Malaysian friends Lucy and Maisarah. 

Earlier,we had the idea of celebrating Chinese New Year in a smaller scale for Lucy, however our plans continued to fan out  and we ended up throwing a party to all our International teacher friends. One of the best things in our celebration was all of us cooked different dishes and none of them were Chinese, only Lucy made some Chinese dishes which were not really Chinese as they were fusioned with western dishes (according to Lucy). We enjoyed eating the cuisines from different continents and also managed to throw a surprise birthday bash to our beloved lecturer Dr. Klar A.K.A Hans.   While having fun we also had the chance to meet other international friends who were there to join us in the celebration, we invited some and some were invited by others. There were 30 of us and Lucy thought her apartment was going to collapse, we managed some how. Besides throwing party, we also had some traditional Chinese customs introduced to our friends during the celebration such as the "Yee - Sang" and "Ang Pow" tradition. Well, the "Ang Pows were not given in USD but in RM, thanks to Maisarah she has a lot of RM1s in her purse which she brought all along to US . I contributed which ever RM I had in my pocket. Well, whoever got it will not be able to spend it and have to keep it with them unless they are planning to go to the money - changer..lol!  During the celebration nobody was allowed to use fork and spoon, but only chopsticks, many of them managed to eat using chopsticks but the others just gave up and went to their old ways....haha. It was definitely a memorable event for me as well as for the other fellows. I'm not going to say much , the pictures below will say a thousand words......

Yee - Sang prepared by Lucy 

Surprise Birthday for Dr.Klar a.k.a Hans

Eat, Laugh and Love.....

Evans and Patrick from Ghana experimenting chopsticks

Before I end, in Malaysia most of the time we are divided by colours, creed and religions. However, when we leave Malaysia and live in another country many of us learn to appreciate other Malaysians, regardless colours and creed. Here,  Lucy, Maisarah and I are known as Malaysians not as Malay, Chinese and Indian...... We are trying to be the archtype of  excellent Malaysians who can live harmoniously despite being different from one another....I just hope some people in Malaysia will realise this...

Creative Writing Lesson 1

At the moment, I am reading my creative writing teaching manual whilst doing my dissertation and completing assignments at Clemson University. I have always had problems with my students especially the good one and on questions that I always have in my mind is " What will lift my students’ writing to a higher level? 

Of course, there is not one single thing that will suddenly improve a student’s writing. All too often their writing is too literal. Or, it is too clichéd. But, over the years, I have come to the conclusion that students rarely use metaphors in their writing. Yes, personification is used with glee and similes are used like antibiotics in the modern world, but metaphors, never and something that I found in my precious creative writing book, glad that I spent my grants on books like this and will spend more probably my one month salary from Malaysia will be used to salvage all the books that I can't find in Malaysia....mom is gonna go crazy as I already have house full of books...yeaaa. 

We, Do we English teachers explore metaphors???, I do explore the use of metaphors in everything under the sun, but rarely, if I am honest, do we get students to write metaphors. This is what I am going to share with you people, I haven't tried it out, why don't you try it out with your good and mediocre students and see what is the outcome,, any outcome good or bad please share with me... I will be glad to know....

This is how it should go....

give them this piece of work; 

Welcome to the dawn of a new beginning, an epoch of enlightenment and a feast of wonders. Sit yourself on the manacles of education and unlock your survival kits and release its secrets. First, open your libraries of wonder. Find a desert of emptiness that is ready for new delights. Open your grenades of ink and spread some shrapnel of damage. Across the fog of blankness, draw a road. On the motorway write the wrinkles of time on it. 

ask the students to identify the things which are being described : 

Then, explore and discuss each of the metaphors and their meanings , also discuss the purpose of the metaphor.

Metaphors are used to….

A - Add a new layer of meaning

B - Create a particular atmosphere

C - Provide a point of comparison

D – Make the writing seem poetic / crafted

We have to remind our students that we can’t keep a reader engaged when every other word is a metaphor, this is important as students in Malaysia tend to overuse something new that they learn and when everything goes wrong the teachers will be blamed, so be clear with them. However, when there are a few in a paragraph, the writing is more engaging. 

Finally, you can get students to write a paragraph about a photograph of a beach. Here are just a few examples :

• A fisherman’s tears – waves 
• Neptune’s minions – fish 
• Medusa’s hair – seaweed 
• Ink stains – rocks in the sea 

As a start we can ask our students to just write simple sentences using metaphors, remember this is a step by step process, we can't aspect them to give us the 'wow' metaphors in just one night. 

Then the next lesson we can start with getting students to fill the blanks with writing metaphors.

A book is ……

• A window to another world. 
• A drug for the imagination. 
• Therapy for the educated. 

This leads me to think about metaphors and non-fiction. Maybe I should be getting students to work on metaphors for the narrative writing in the SPM English exams. Every so often I could have a metaphor starter, focusing on the generation of metaphors. 

Happy Teaching peeps!!

International Teachers' Visit Berea High School, Greenville

Today I had the opportunity to visit Berea High School which is one of the best performing schools in Greenville. Besides having the opportunity to see the school environment, I also had the chance to talk to the principal Dr.Noel ( the principals I have come across in US have P.hds in Educational Leadership). The high school environment is definitely not as how it has been fed into our minds through the mainstream media, the kids were respectful, friendly and very welcoming. I also had the chance to observe a few English classes ; Literature, Reading, Creative Writing (my favourite of all) and also drama. I was amazed with the teachers' styles of teaching and their classroom management. I believe it has got to do with the number of students in the classes that help the teachers to take charge easily. Their teacher - student ratio is 1 : 22. However, I am sure I use more interesting ways to teach reading ....hahaha   

At Berea High School

I was also introduced to the school Instructional coaches, they are similar to the SISC (school Improvement Special Coaches) in Malaysia. In US, the school instructional coaches do not move around from one school to another school to observe teachers and make comments but they stay put at one school and work together with the teachers to develop their area of specialization. At Berea high school there are 4 instructional coaches and one of them is for English language. I was told that she helps to improve the schools results by working with the teachers to develop literacy programs, create modules as well as develops and demonstrates best teaching practices.

 

with the English Language Instructional Coach

One thing I realized is, in US  the responsibility of being a principal is definitely not given to any Tom, Dick or Harry. Having observed Dr. Black (RMS) and Dr.Noel (Berea) I would definitely say that their knowledge in Educational Leadership has got to do something with their performance at school and I believe it is their leadership that has brought the schools to a meritorious level.

with Dr.Noel during the briefing session...

This does not mean that I am dreaming of becoming a principal in future…….if I were to have plans for my future development, being a principal will be at the bottom of my list or not in the list at all, I am comfortable with what I am doing now and will continue to do so……

I have always thought that the auditorium which I used to see in the American series 'Glee'
was a mere exaggeration until I saw a real high school theatre,,,,

MGS Montage

I made this montage for our Hari Anugerah 2014 and thought of sharing it here.....

Shadowing the life of an American Student.......

This is Dawson and Me with Macy

Today instead of doing my normal school routine I decided to shadow a student to all his classes to experience the life of an American student. It turned out to be an exciting and learning experience. The student whom I shadowed was Dawson, an 8th Grader ( 14 years old). He was handsome and had blue sparkling eyes.... He was warm and very respectful in his own ways. I got along very well with him within a few minutes.. The classes he had today was English reading (Honors), Mathematics, Social Science( History), Science, English writing, music and Bible Studies. 

  

Technology made the lessons easier to understand

I followed  him to all the classes and had great opportunities to observe different teaching styles of different teachers.  Different teachers had different styles in handling their students and all of them had the aura of their own… some teachers made sure the students remained quiet throughout their lessons, some had amazing group activities and made sure students were engaged and some had great ICT skills that they made learning so simple. One similarity I noticed among the teachers was, they were all using technology during their lessons and I am sure they were not doing it because I was there as the teachers were not aware I was shadowing Dawson and gave a surprise look when I showed up in their classrooms with Dawson, however they were very welcoming. They did not use any specific software, but exploited whichever software  or online tools which was free and available. It was easy for the teachers as these softwares/tools were not so complicated and made their lives easy.

Dawson, do not have fixed classmates, his classmates differs from one lesson to another lesson based on their ability and the previous year’s results, and the school do not have uniformed lessons as well. The lessons differ from one class to another depends on students’ learning ability. For example, If a student is in English Reading(honors) class, it means this class is for students who have higher level of understanding texts where at this level they learn to study literature deeper. They study  Charles Dicken's, Great expectations which is meant for higher level, where as the weaker ones will not study Charles Dickens but a simpler one which help to build their ability to understand texts better.

I did not shadow Dawson to his bible studies as it was conducted in a church nearby; in America religious studies are not allowed to be conducted in the school compounds as to respect and not influence students of other religions and it is not compulsory. They truly practice 'respect all religions' policy.

Different lessons at different classes

My day ended with a happy note......

Using Songs in the English Classrooms

I believe in making my lessons as interesting as possible in any ways which are possible. One of the ways are using songs to teach language skills to our students. Here are a set of worksheets which are based on songs sung by Ricky Martin, Britney Spears, Christina Arguilera and so on... I have been collecting and using them for years so now I think it is time to share some of them.... However, I don't have the links to the vevos  as I downloaded the songs a long time ago using Youtube...you can do the same as well....Click here to download the worksheets.

Malaysians' Ways of Lives to the Eyes of American Children...

Today was another interesting day for me as I had the opportunity to carry out my first lesson with the 8th graders at Riverside Middle School and the topic of my lesson was Introduction to Malaysia and the Malaysian culture. During my lesson I shared several things about Malaysia with the students. I talked about the Malaysians’ ways of greetings, their festivals and the sumptuous food found in Malaysia.

Besides, I also shared some information about the two schools that I have worked with in Malaysia; SMK Bintulu and MGS, Ipoh. The students were very excited to learn about something that was completely alien to them.

The Traditional Malay Ways of Greeting

I was taken aback when the students did not know anything about Malaysia. They had a lot of questions about our food, people and also culture. I had weird response from them too when I told them that we also celebrate Christmas in Malaysia….a student stated “ You celebrate Christmas in Malaysia?”…They did not know that we have Christians who celebrate Christmas.....

The students seemed to enjoy the lesson as I did some demonstration on how to greet the people here during their festivals and the traditional Malay style of greeting. The students were active and inquisitive learners, so they bombarded me with so many questions, the one hour lesson was just not enough to describe everything about Malaysia...….

All together I had five hours lesson with five different classes, repeating the same thing about Malaysia, at the end of the day I was very tired, but at the same time I was very happy as I had a sense of achievement….the experiences that I have gained all these while through various courses and training sessions as well as my debating skills has helped me to brave through my lessons today.

I am looking forward for my next lessons to see what I can learn from the students and also teachers at the Riverside Middle school who seem to be very excited to have us with them… at least they get a break from their 5 or 6 hours lesson routine that they have every day…  I will soon share about the teachers’ routine in US…

see yaa....!!

First Day Teacher Internship in an American School........

It was a bright sunny day, the sky was a soft shade of blue and there was a slight breeze in the air. I stepped out of the cab that was sending us for our teacher internship right in front of the entrance of  Riverside Middle School. I did not know why, my heart was thumping really hard that it could jump out .. perhaps it was because that was my first day in a completely different environment as a teacher,,,, other teacher interns were equally nervous as all of them we very quiet in the cab. 

       Once we were inside the school building, we were shown our way to the office to meet the principal Dr.Kevin Black, a charismatic man in his forties who has shown high leadership skills in Riverside Middle and gained the highest esteem from the teachers there. I did notice at my first glance that he was a man who lead by example. I saw him running the school with great care and concern. He was rather very friendly and warm to the students. One thing I noticed about him was when he needed some students to arrange the chair at the assembly hall he called them in and arranged the chairs with them ( something that I have never seen in Malaysia, where principals only give orders and never lifted a finger.......,oppps no offence).  His exemplary acts are followed by the teachers as well. 

            During the assembly we were asked to introduce ourselves, we did but the students did not seemed to respond while we were introducing ourselves, there was a pin drop silence at the assembly hall and all their eyes were on us.. Despite the jitters, I  put a brave front and introduced myself to the students... I think they were told to keep quiet and watch their manners as they were all very quiet( we used to do that in Malaysia when we have visitors right?)....hahahahahaha

After the assembly ended we were approached by some students and they welcomed us in their american accent and asked more things about our countries till they were shooed away by a disciplinarian.. One thing I notice during my first day was the students do not greet their teachers with a 'good morning' or 'good afternoon' but with a simple 'hi' or 'hey' and the teachers seem to be okay with that.( In Malaysia, the "goods"is a must to show respect right? well that's our asian culture)

I was then approached by Miss. Wendy Hawkins and she informed me that my teacher partner Ms. Sharon was unable to come to school and  she will be my teacher partner till Ms. Sharon comes back. So I followed her to her class. Since it was my first day of internship, all I did was introducing myself to the students and sit and observe Ms. Wendy Hawkins. It was a great experience to be with Miss. Hawkins on my first day of internship because Ms. Hawkins has won the ‘Teacher of The Year’ award several times in the district and state. She shared her files, her lesson plans, the syllabus and also her modules generously, she even allowed me to make copies of her materials.... Such a great generosity!!!!!!!!!

Ms.Hawkin's Awards 

Ms. Hawkins teaches writing to 8^th grade students (Form 2 in Malaysia). Her teaching style is completely different and in USA they are definitely using the 21^st century teaching skills and she limits her role as a guide and facilitator in the class and allow students to explore the ideas on their own using laptops and other gadgets. Her writing lessons start with a simple short journal writing activity related to the topics/theme that they are learning and she continues her lesson with her current lesson. Currently she is piloting project based learning, where students are required to read, adopt and adapt articles form certain sites on the internet. Students are required to complete a four paged guided report based on their research on internet and their final work will be composition based on the knowledge that they have gained from their research they did on the internet. It was really, really interesting…In Malaysia, we have always seen that teachers including me  can start and complete one essay writing activity in just two - periods but here in US one writing lesson can be stretched to weeks, they really stress on the quality of writing by making sure students know what they are writing. Right now I am thinking of adapting this project- based learning activity in Malaysia once I am back and it is going to be exciting to bring back something worth it … at least for those who are thinking that I am having a holiday now they know that I am actually doing something beneficial here…hahahaha…..

American textbooks and teacher guide manuals 

Back to the American classroom, Ms. Hawkin’s classroom is very organised and she loves blue, so she decorated her classroom in blue which was eyes - soothing. I loved the arrangement. The number of her students in her class is about 20 to 25. I was told that a maximum number of students she supposed to have is only 25 and cannot be more than that. Being a teacher for 18 years she organizes her classroom so well and her students seem to love her so much… I did not see any errand offenders on my first day.. the kids seem to be very loving and fun. I saw some cheeky ones too who seem to be excited to see us and tried to crack jokes….I just laughed although I did not know what they were saying…hahahaha

The American classroom is so cool.........

 My first day was really  awesome and looking forward to go to school again and carry out my 1^st lesson which will be about Malaysia…I am excited and will share once I am done with it…..

Year 2015 - fulfilling My American Dream.....

Hello people..........with the blessings of  Almighty,  2014 has been a great year as I had countless achievements and accolades.....millions of thanks to everyone who has made all the awards and achievements possible.....and without the support of family and friends as well as divine intervention nothing would have been possible.....

Experiencing snow for the first time 

I would say the divine intervention did not stop in 2014 but continues in 2015 as I am embarking a journey of lifetime for the next few months of my life in USA a country that many people like me would want to go....I am indeed lucky to be selected in an International Program which is held in America where I get to meet and live with teachers from other countries as well as attend classes at Clemson University and will be teaching in a Middle School here in South Carolina....

my crazy classmates

For many, they would think that this is a paid holiday, but for me, it is different....... it is time to learn and share as well as to bring back countless wisdom back to my country to be shared with my colleagues and of course I will visit all the places that I got to see in Hollywood movies.....hahahaha.....

Regards, 

Mohana