About course

1. What do you like about blogging??
- I like blogging for two reasons. Firstly, it provides me with a room to share my feelings. Secondly, by blogging, I reflect upon my learning.

2 What do you don’t like about blogging?
- Frankly speaking, blogging via BlogSpot does not help me much compared to blogging via space in Windows Live. I feel that blogging should be used as a mean to encourage self and peer evaluation. Lecturer and friends should be exchanging opinion via blogs.

3. What have you gained from blogging?
- Via blogging, I learnt how to rationalize my learning.

4. How?
- After each class, I am supposed to write a blog in which I am supposed to reflect upon my learning. This helps me to think critically upon the lecturer’s instruction and advice besides my learning.

5. What do you like about this course?
- When I evaluate my progress for the past 14 weeks, I realise that I have learnt a lot... The content of the course is what I like the most in this course.

6. What you do not like about this course?
- Well, though I understand the rationale behind the heavy workload, at times I feel that it is really overwhelming. Even if I do a tutorial per day, it is impossible to finish all 96 within the 14 weeks. Added with the exercises and heavy workloads from other subjects, at times I feel like giving up. I also do not like the idea of wasting papers and ink to print assignments when it can be done through internet.

7. What have you learnt from this course?
- As a whole, I learnt all the skills listed in the modules, how to prepare teaching aids and how to plan a good lesson.

8. What have you learnt from this course that you did not expect to?
- Well, I came to this class with an empty mind. Hence, everything is an unexpected learning. But, it was an eye-opener for me to get to know about e-Book.

9. What you have expected but you do not learn from this course?
-I expect to learn on designing webpage through this course but I did not learn it.

10. If you can change anything about this course, state what it is and elaborate.
-As a conclusion, I would say that i would be glad if the course can be delivered through a more structured manner. For example, through Windows Live whereby blogging and course content can be delivered simultaneously.

Week 14

Symptoms that the digital future has arrived
What’s colorless, odorless and has been silently seeping into our child’s backpack, classroom, playroom and library?
Our child’s digital future. After 25 years of rosy predictions from experts, there are signs that the long-awaited tipping point for technology & learning has arrived. If you’re one of the many impatient people—like me— who have been waiting for that LED at the end of tunnel, I think that this time it is really happening. Here’s why.
• Batteries. For the first time, batteries are able to power a netbook through a six-hour school day on a single charge. They’re smaller, lighter and powerful; the heart and lungs of iPods, Nintendo DSis, toys and netbooks. See the Cinemin, on page 20 for example.
• LEDs. (Light Emitting Diods) are molded into your child’s shoes, and lighting the earrings on the new Dora Links doll.
• Wi-Fi. Thanks to eRate, most schools were wired years ago. Unfortunately the Internet never made it to the child’s desktop. There are signs this is starting to change. For the first time in her K-12 education, my daughter, a high school senior, is now encouraged to bring her laptop to school. And half of her teachers are using Moodle for assignments.
• The App store and Google Ads. Small publishers can make money from their interactive ideas, and reach their intended audience, sidestepping the retail bottleneck.
• Cloud computing. Google’s gmail, YouTube, Facebook and Flickr have earned the trust of the masses, including many of our children who are flocking to games like FarmVille (page 21).
• Flash 10. It used to be that online animation chugged. Not anymore. I just previewed a virtual world for children that is fast, responsive and -- for the first time— is in 3D.
• Kinesthetic (motion based) interfaces. The Wii was magic. This year, there’s more. Besides the Wii-Motionplus, there’s Microsoft’s Project Natal, which uses cameras to detect motion. Interface guru Jakob Nielson points out two motion-based Windows 7 features: "Snap" (the ability to resize open Windows) and "Shake" (grab a window, hold your mouse button and give it a shake to hide the windows behind it). Nielson writes, "Both may herald a renaissance for the gestural interaction styles."
• Multitouch. Apple's multitouch/accelerometer combination is "the perfect storm" for children's interactivity. Compare it to the DSi monotouch screen and you have "dumb touch" and "smart touch" from this point forward
• There’s a Wii in the Whitehouse. Barack Obama is the first president to type a book on a computer, use a Blackberry and post speeches on YouTube. Both of his daughters play video games. This could open the door for more research and policy related to interactive media.
Now that the digital future has arrived, what does it mean? For one, there will be a lot more to review. It’s safe to say that 2010 will bring a surge in new children’s apps, sites, games and toys, and we’re ready to critique them. Enjoy the issue.

PS. Did you know that more kids watch online videos on YouTube.com than on Disney.com, Nick.com and CartoonNetwork.com, combined? Learn how to harness the power of YouTube for kids, in LittleClickers (p. 4)
hence, in this last blog, i would like to remind dear friends and myself that we need to update ourselves with these techological stuffs in order to cater our pupils' need.

week 13

Assignment 4: Lesson plan. Developing fabulous teaching materials is not a credit to become a good teacher. Using those materials in the correct phase of teaching and learning is another skill a teacher should acquire. The fourth assignment not only provided me with the opportunity to develop teaching materials but also give me the opportunity to plan a lesson. Given the so called easiest skill, listening, I have to develop two lesson plans. My first lesson plan is on H1N1 and it intends to teach vocabulary such as cough, throw, sneeze, wash and wear. For this lesson plan, I intend to use a video and task sheets as below. The second lesson plan deals with ways to maintain fitness and it intends to teach vocabulary such as spin, jump, twist, flap and freeze. This lesson plan is founded on the total physical response approach. By doing this assignment, I have learnt many facts about being a teacher. Although it sounds simple, planning a lesson is not easy. Several factors such as learners, proficiency and teaching and learning theory need to be addressed while devising each step. I believe this experience will equip me to become a planner of teaching in future.

week 12

Developing teaching materials for Year 4 pupils based on KBSR topics??? After scanning through the topics listed, I chose Story time, More Stories and Getting Connected as my topics. Then I started working on the E-Books assigned to me by my group members.
The first eBook has been produced using Microsoft Power-Point and some pictures which we have got through Google Image search engine and edited using FotoFX. This eBook is about a boy who went to beach without his mother’s knowledge to play soccer. While they were playing, one of the friends kicked the ball hard that it got into the sea. To show off, the boy went into the sea to get the ball and got into trouble which nearly make him loose his life . This eBook can be presented during while-reading stage after some of the important vocabulary, such as muttered, crept, spotted, tangled and exhausted are taught. Through this eBook, moral values such as being humble and being honest can be cultivated. Besides that, the main objective of using this eBook should be to cultivate reading habits. Humanist’s view on learning suggests that learning only take place if the learning environment is right and the learners are interested in learning. Since the setting of the story is familiar with Malaysia pupils and the characters are colourful and human characters, we believe pupils would be interested in reading and be able to comprehend this eBook.


The second eBook has been produced using Microsoft Power-Point and some pictures which we have got through Google Image search engine and edited using FotoFX. The story centres on animals in a jungle, Bako, who experiences the evolution of technology in their habitat. The postman team in the jungle were reluctant to accept this changes due to their fear of losing their jobs but the king insisted with his plan. He proposed a solution, which the team followed, and gained success from that only benefited the team but also the whole kingdom. This eBook is meant to be presented during while reading stage. Through this eBook, pupils are expected to gain some information on the latest technology which is keeping us, human being connected. Since the content of the lesson is heavy and can be quite boring, we have used animal characters, which we all know children would be interested in, to present it. Krashen in his Monitor Model 1982 via Affective Filter Hypothesis places a great emphasize on pupils’ emotion and suggest that correct choose of input would be able to lower the filter that prevents learning. Therefore, we hope through the use of animal characters and beautiful pictures, the content can be easily delivered to children.


The third is eBook would be appropriate to be used during while reading stage. This eBook has been produced using Microsoft Power-Point and pictures which we have developed in GoAnimate webpage and extracted using PhotoScape. The story depicts a lazy boy by the name Samuel who encounters an elf. The elf is supposed to help Samuel to do his homework. The elf did help but he also has turned Samuel into a hardworking boy till Samuel’s changes impressed his parents. Teacher and friends. Grabbed, granted, yelled, wrinkled and shrieked are some of the vocabulary that can be taught using this eBook. The teacher may want to use pictures to demonstrate the action words above in the pre-pre reading stage before she starts using this eBook so that children would be able to understand the words clearly as they appear in the context. We have used animated pictures in this eBook to accompany the text so that they help the children to imagine the abstract element in the story which is the Elf. Another reason behind the use of animated pictures is that they would attract and sustain pupils’ attention as they are colourful and captivating. We hope this feature added by the Comic Sans font and animation in presentation will lower pupils affective filter and support their learning.


Developing these e-books allowed me to have a taste of preparing teaching materials. I realised that ICT has made teacher’s life in this era of globalization easy by providing them with lots opportunities to develop great teaching resources. It just lies on the teacher’s effort and initiative to utilize these resources and make their classroom a better one or not.

week 11

Though we planned well, but not everything we planned works. After searching for the casts for almost one and half week, we gave up. So, we switched to the only alternative we had which is GoAnimate. After completing the animations through various steps that includes few above, we recorded our video using Camtasia software.
Then, using moviemaker, we inserted an audio as background music to make the vedio more interesting.
At last, we managed to produce the video below.

By producing this video, I personally improved in using window movie maker. I would say it is a new venture in my learning because this is my first experience. Through many trial and errors, I learnt how to use windows movie maker effectively. After completing the animations through various steps that includes few above, we recorded our video using Camtasia software. Then, using moviemaker, we inserted an audio as background music to make the vedio more interesting. At last, we managed to produce the video below. By producing this video, I personally improved in using window movie maker. I would say it is a new venture in my learning because this is my first experience. Through many trial and errors, I learnt how to use windows movie maker effectively.

week 10

Hi!!! As I promised, here is the story entitled ‘Triple Filter’. It is moral story founded on the theme on friendship. This is the way we would like to present our story.

Scene 1
"Sam, do you know what I just heard about your friend?"
(A static photo flashback)

Scene 2.
"Hold on a minute," Sam replied. "Before telling me anything I'd
like you to pass a little test.
It's called the Triple Filter Test."
"Triple filter?"
(A static image of big question mark)

Scene 3.
"That's right," Sam continued. "Before you talk to me about my
friend, it might be a good idea to take a moment and filter what you're
going to say. The first filter is Truth. Have you made absolutely sure
that what you are about to tell me is true?"
"No," the man said, "actually I just heard about it and..."
"All right," said Sam. "So you don't really know if it's true or
not.
(A slide with the word “truth”)

Scene 4.
Now let's try the second filter, the filter of Goodness. Is what
you are about to tell me about my friend something good?"
"No, on the contrary..."
"So," Sam continued, "you want to tell me something bad about him,
but you're not certain it's true.
(A slide with the word “goodness”)


Scene 5.
You may still pass the test though,
because there's one filter left: the filter of Usefulness. Is what you
want to tell me about my friend going to be useful to me?"
(A slide with the word “usefulness”)

Scene 6
"No, not really."
"Well," concluded Sam, "if what you want to tell me is neither
true nor good nor even useful, why tell it to me at all?"
(A slide on moral of the story)
This is the story we have chosen and the way we have planned it to be recorded.

“Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion.”

Jack Welch quotes



Since we wanted to become a good video maker in UMLand, we have followed the first two steps in the quote, which we embrace as our guide for this ‘project’. Hopefully, we can go through the next two successfully especially the video shooting stage which consists of choosing the casts, finding the props and editing the recording.

week 9

One of the topic which captured my eyes’ attention when I first saw Proforma was video editing. At last, today we arrived at the “Land of UMwood”.
The lecture started with an exposure to different types of videos and suggestions on software that can be used for this topic. After a review on senior’s assignments, we were asked to come up with a 5 minutes video proposal. After squeezing our brain, we came up with the idea of producing an animated video. The story line...


Scene 1: A five years old girl called the operator

Scene 2: The girl asks for heaven’s number
Operator gets shocked and asks why
Girl answers that her grandmother told her that her mother went to heaven
and she wants to talk to her mother because she is having a terrible
stomach ache
Scene 3: Operator asks for apology and tells that she does not have

Scene 4: The girl walks to her father’s room and tells the father
The father reflects upon his act that not only leads to HIV transmission to
him, his wife and child but also his wife’s death


Scene 5: The father ask for apology from the girl and give her medicine

Scene 6: Question the audience

After checking the availability of setting and characters in Goanimate website, with full of confidence, we presented our proposal.:( It was rejected due to several factors. Firstly, the use of heaven concept is not appropriate. Secondly, negative matters should not be exemplified to children although the moral message is there. Lastly, the mood of the video is too gloomy for children. This incident, personally have taught me to be more careful in my planning of content of video as my target audience are children.

Then, we started working on a new story which we called ‘Triple filter’. Want to know what is it about? Wait for my next blog...Till then, take care.

week 8

Yesterday, I was looking at my Proforma and I realised that I have sailed through more than half a semester. When I was registering for this course a few months ago (I was in my beloved IPIK when I was doing that), I was cursing myself for not mastering ICT skills. (This is because when I was doing my assignments in IPIK, I pushed all the ICT works which required me to use more than Microsoft Word, Microsoft Power Point Presentation and Microsoft Publisher to Haziq because he is better in it and because of my fear for ICT).I was aware of the content of this subject and I had a great fear that I might fail the course. But, after entering the class, my beliefs changed. I felt that although I am a late bloomer in term of ICT, I still can learn.
Where there is a will, there is a way. Pauline Kael
True enough. When I am evaluating what my learning in this course holistically now, I realise that it has moved me miles away from my past state. I have learnt to upload
, encode and convert
via internet skills tutorials, to edit pictures and photos through photo editing skills tutorials
and to edit audio recordings and songs through audio editing tutorials. Although I am having a great deal learning and exploring on the same time, I believe all these knowledge I have gained, will enhance my credibility to I become a teacher in future.

Hopefully, i would become one.

week 7

Have to edit a song and some recordings in a week time? ‘That’s a lot!’. This was the first thought which flushed together with blood into my brain. While taking a deep breath, I told myself.
Convert bad news to good news.
Bill Gates
After changing my mind set, I started working on them.

For the individual task, I was very confused on which song to edit because i hardly have any English songs in my collection. After thinking for an hour, I finally got the idea. I planned to edit the song which annoyed me very much a year ago with its chorus, the song sung by AKON by the title ‘Lonely’. Then, went to a website which I found when I was doing my tutorials for internet skills and downloaded the song before I started editing it. I would say that I had a great time editing it especially when I was exploring the software and when I was in my ‘trial and error’ stage. I tried to insert a few numbers into the ‘percentage change’ but the pitch went higher and higher until at one point I felt like giving up.
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Never give up, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turnJust as the quote says, an idea struck my mind and I managed to accomplish my attempt. I tried using a ‘–‘ sign before the number and it worked. Success!!!


On Monday, I started working on my group task. It took hours for me to download all the three videos assigned on my shoulder and that really put me into boredom. Once I got all the recording downloaded, I started working on them. I managed to enhance the clarity of the recording by boosting the bass but even though I tried hard, I did not manage to remove some of the noise which existed in the recording. Until now, I could not find the solution for that problem.

While I was waiting for the recording to be downloaded, I spent a few minutes pondering on the usefulness of learning this skill to my future career as a teacher. I realised that learning this skill will empower me with the knowledge to edit the audio teaching materials which I might want to use in class. I may want to add some learning points into, throw some irrelevant and unsuitable content from and enhance the clarity of my audio. Besides that, this skill also will help me to bring in more authentic materials into classroom which will be very helpful for children in learning their oral communication skills and are of children’s interest. Therefore, I strongly believe that every teacher especially who is teaching the 21st century kids should be exposed to this

BE ETHICAL`

I went to a restaurant yesterday and ordered my food. When the waiter came and served my food, I thanked him. When I was paying for my food,
Waiter: Abang ni cikgu ke?
Me: Ye. Mana adik tahu?
Waiter: Ada gaya ckigu

That incident made me think. What have made him say so? Was it the way I talk? Or the way I behaved? Well, after pondering on it, I think it is my ethic or way of conduct/behaving. Then, it strokes my mind to write on this topic so here am I to share some knowledge I have gained through my knowledge.

The teaching profession, as many others, has its own code of ethics, which describes the process of grading students and teacher's behaviour in the classroom as well as outside the premises of the institution. It is one of few professions which evaluate the totality of behaviour of an individual and its potential influence on others, in this case – students. When discussing teacher's ethics, one must consider it on two separate plateaus. Firstly, the legal one, or so to say, administrative, where all aspects of teacher's behaviour, teaching procedures, and assessment of students are framed into a set of regulations drawn up by the Ministry of Education and by individual schools. And secondly, at the personal level, which includes a teacher's own attitude and conduct that is not otherwise prescribed by law or whose breach might never be detected or pursued in a grievance process. The teacher's code of ethics comprises his/her duties, responsibilities, attitude, honesty, and most of all - fairness.
What are the potential breaches of the teacher's code of ethics?
This is a list of a few in no particular order.
• Having inappropriate relationships with students (sexual, business partnership, “after school buddies”, drinking binges, etc)
• Violation of clearly stated school rules and educational procedures
• Failing to perform duties (no teaching, chaos, wrong attitude toward the teaching profession, etc)
• Imposing on students personal views unrelated to the subject of a lesson or promoting such, especially some that do not represent the main stream (extreme political or religious views, views on controversial social issues, interest of a particular social group, etc).
• Improper grading, partiality, and lack of fairness (based on who is liked, who is not; race, past performance, background, etc)
• Exposing students to embarrassment or disparagement (emotional or psychological harassment)
• Invading students' privacy
• Engaging students in unethical behaviour
• Accepting gifts and favours, quid pro quo (“for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the righteous")
• Deceiving students and their parents.
This list can go on, from violations of criminal laws, through commonly-accepted standards of good and evil, violation of public trust, to unprofessional job performance.
Among all these, I think most of us, no matter who we are, how old we are and how educated we are, are in risk of committing this particular ‘Crime’
- Failing to perform duties-
(no teaching, chaos, wrong attitude toward the teaching profession, etc)
because
Mistakes are a part of being human. Appreciate your mistakes for what they are: precious life lessons that can only be learned the hard way. Unless it's a fatal mistake, which, at least, others can learn from.
Al Franken, "Oh, the Things I Know", 2002
Therefore, I have told myself that I should monitor my deeds constantly so that I won’t those fatal crimes listed above. How about you all teachers out there?

week 6

Photo editing is something completely new to me. Even in using Paint in my laptop, I used ask hundred and one question to my friends especially Haziq and Gowrey.
Hence, I have been struggling in exploring the software especially Adobe Photoshop CS3 and juggling in learning the skills. After many trials and errors, I think I managed to get hold of it. Here is a work of mine using Adobe Photoshop CS3 and FxFoto softwares.


from




and





I enjoyed doing these but I would prefer to be given more time to explore the software and a brief lecture on what the functions are in and how to use the software.
Until we are told to make a power-point presentation for our E-Book, I did not see the importance of me learning the photo editing skills. When we were asked for a storyboard, ambitiously i came up with a story rooted on the theme of patriotism. Only when started to think about putting the pictures on slides after I got back home, I realised my ‘mistake’. As the saying goes, ‘there is no point crying over the split milk’ so I continued thinking of means to make my presentation a success. When I was about to give up, an idea stroked my mind. That is to design animation on Goanimate webpage and to use Photoscape software to print screen slides. After doing that, I cropped the pictures using Adobe Photoshop CS3 and make many other amendments using pen tool, brush tool, blush tool and eraser tool before I came up with those fine pictures on my slides. Only after that, I realised how useful these skills would be for me as a future teacher to teach. this is because I have experienced situations whereby I dropped some of my teaching points and ideas because I could not get the visual aids I wanted from the net. After learning these skills, I do not think I will face such situations anymore because I can edit what I got to be what I want. As people always say, "I have learn from my 'mistake'". Thank you for teaching this, ma'am.

week 5

In most of the classrooms in schools in Malaysia, we have average of 35-45 pupils. As teachers, we need to know how to control our pupils so that we can impart the knowledge we intend to successfully. One of the strategies you can use is by knowing your pupils respond to various kinds of teaching and learning activities. As teachers, we need to identify activities which stir and settle our pupils. The best way to identify is by trying and making a list. We also can categorise the activities into stir and settle by looking at form of responds it requires, either written or spoken. Identifying the types of involvement each activity requires would be the third mean. An activity may require mental engagement or actual occupation. Mental engagement activity requires thinking and involves emotion. An example would be guessing. Actual occupation activities are those which require concentration and involve physical. Once a teacher managed to identify the effect of each activity, the teacher should adapt the activities he/she has planned according to the pupils’ emotional state. For an example, pupils will be highly active after Physical Education. Therefore, if a teacher has planned an activity which has a stir effect, he/she should adapt it to a settle activity in order to control the class and get the kids into learning. On contrast, teachers should choose an activity that encourages pupils in a dull class. As teachers, we should not have the guilt of breaking our plans because no activity or particular sequence of activities is good if it is in the wrong place in terms of human reaction to the lesson.
Here are several tips for good classroom management:
1 Combine stir and settle activities
2. Combine mental engagement and actual occupation activity
3. Vary your activities for the same topics move systematically according to
skills
4. Take into account ‘fun’
5. Keep the lesson simple
6. Reuse material
7. Reuse ideas.

week 4

I entered for the fourth week lecture with full of expectations t learn something new but ‘Kwang! Kwang! Kwang!’ the server was down and we could not assess internet. So, we were asked to read chapter 2, 3 and 4 and do PowerPoint presentations on them. Hurmmm!
Chapter 2 is about identifying priorities and their implication. The writer suggests that primary schooling should place more importance on achieving primary goals rather than on content goals.
She identifies pleasures and confidence in using language, willingness to have ‘a go’ and daringness to communicate as attitude goals which are different from usual language teaching goals which are content goals such and structure, topics and functions. The writer also emphasises on authenticity and interactive of task whereby she believes that language teaching should provide room for children to observe, analyse and fit into language use. Therefore, she proposes that language should be used for real communication and for genuinely giving and receiving real messages. Pupils in most second language seem to uphold a wrong conception that they need to understand every word used in order to learn the language because of teachers’ emphases on it. In reality, children only need to understand the gist as we are dealing more on whole message. Therefore, teachers should stop emphasizing on discrete language teaching. Instead they should check the overall idea and pupils’ facial expression to judge pupils’ understanding. Teachers also should know how to treat pupils’ mistake without causing any humiliation to pupils. This is because young learners are vulnerable to criticism and it might kill their positive self concept and confidence to learn and use the language. Language teaching can be done in two ways namely language exercises into real exchange and language lessons through the medium of the target language itself. For the first mean, a teacher need to combine real communication and restricted materials to teach language whereas in the second mean, teacher need to use simple language, facial expression, translating method and demonstration strategy. As a whole, this chapter talks about teaching objective and methods, assessment strategies and correct error correcting ways.

week 3

Realisation!!!

“PrtSc”

Though I have been using computers for the past four years, I have never realised that such key exist on my laptop keyboard. The third class of resources served as an eye-opener for me to become aware of the existence of the key and its use. Thanks, ma’am.

The task of the day was to download the last song of Michael Jackson. Frankly typing, I have never downloaded any English song before and I was completely lost when the lecturer asked to download search the song in the Google search engine and download the song. Luckily, there were some good-hearted people who shared their suggestion of the webpage aloud. TQ buddies. From that, I learnt how much peers would be helpful in me exploring and conquering the ICT skills.

After sometime searching, I got the webpage my friends suggested and proceeded with the downloading process. “That’s a shortcut!” The sentence moved via the air and entered my ears before rang an alarm in my brain.

What does the lecturer mean by that???

Go and check!!!


A simple monologue started to take place in my heart and the fear of making mistake urged me to approach the friend who got the comments. OMG!!! All these while, I have been doing that and it is not the correct way of downloading. I should not press on the song before left click and ‘Save target as’. Luckily, my intuition forced me and again thanks for that enlightenment ma’am.

After saving the steps on word document, we were asked to put it on PowerPoint presentation. I like the idea of saving it on PowerPoint and uploading it on space. But, I feel that we will be merely adding to the global warming by wasting papers to print out the assignment later. I may sound like a real Mother Earth lover but actually I am not. Just that, I feel that it is a pure waste to print and throw them later. Hurm....

The class then continued with presentation on last week’s topic. Some of the presentation brought up issues, examples and theories which never strike my mind when I read the chapter in the alone in the book. So, thanks guys for sharing your knowledge and ideas.

week 2 leaners characteristics and office work

The excitement to learn ICT created by the lecturer in the previous lesson drove me to the second class on time. We were informed that we got some ‘office job’ to do but before that, we are asked to read and comprehend Chapter 1.

Chapter 1 addressed six characteristics, skills and instincts, pupils bring with them to language classroom. The first characteristic is children’s ability to grasp learning. According to Susan Halliwell, children start to learn to understand non-verbal cues much earlier before they learn language. They learn how to interpret message or instruction by adults to them by non-verbal cues and develop language ability later. Therefore, she suggested second language teachers to expose children to the language so that they will learn the second language as they learn their first language. In my opinion, I believe children will pick up language if they are constantly exposed to it because all language shares some common features. But, the pupils may need some help from teachers to correct their misconceptions.

Second features of young language learners are they are creative in using limited language resources. They may make-up their own vocabulary and rules. We, as teachers, should understand their journey of exploring language and guide them. We also need to create the urge to communicate in them and ensure that their learning environment is safe because humanists believes that success in learning only occurs when learners have positive attitude to learning.

The third quality that pupils bring to their classroom is their capacity for indirect learning. Susan believes that language learning need not only takes place through direct learning but also indirect learning. I agree with Susan because as Krashen suggested in Acquisition-Learning Hypothesis (monitor Model 1982) pupils can learn and acquire the language. Acquisition will take place with no conscious attention on learning whereas learning occurs through conscious attention to form and rule of learning. Therefore, real work should be set so that learning and acquisition take place.

The fourth trait of young language learners are their instinct for play and fun. We, teachers should understand their nature of liking play and fun and manipulate it so that learning tales place in the best condition. We can use games to teach language.

The fifth attribute of pupils is their imagination. Children are rich in their imagination and creativeness. Therefore, we as teachers should design activities which promote their imagination and ask them to share their ideas so that they develop their language white communicating their thoughts.

The last characteristic pupils bring with them into language classroom is their instinct for interaction and talk. Since we are aware that children love to talk, we should vary the mode of interaction in the classroom so that we encourage them to use the language and would not have a hard time managing them.

Then, the office work started. We were asked to segregate our seniors’ assignments according to the topics we are going to learn starting from next week. There are all together five topics namely internet skills, video editing, audio editing, picture editing and software. Out of these five topics, I would say that I have only mastered half of the internet skills. Therefore, I have a lot more to learn and I am eagerly waiting to conquer ICT so that I can utilize the knowledge in preparing my teaching aids later.

week 1

Just to get started
Firstly, thank you ma'am. You are giving me time to explore and learn, not like the other subject in which the lecturer moved like bullet train. Before this, I just hate ICT but now i'm slowly liking it. I wish the lectures will be paced at this rate so that I can cope with it. I have no idea of what a blog is before this but now I think i have a rough idea of it. Hope to learn more new stuffs which will equip me to become a better teacher in future.