Reflection Week 11

Oh no! This week Ma'am Foziah came in sick. Too add oild to fire, there were little little things like people coming in late, slow responses and so on, making the class atmosphere very tensed =(

Since we from the tuesday group joined the thursday class, the class was almost chaotic with the noise level. Despite of that, the class got on with the thursday class presentations regarding the articles assigned by Ma'am.

When the presentations were done, we thought we could finally break away from the tensed atmosphere. But lo and behold, there're more waiting for us to endure.

Firdaus, our classs rep, suddenly asked us if we remembered that we have an assignment dued on the 15th of October, two weeks from now. Of course, all of us were shocked as we totally forgot about the assignment!

Thus, chaos broke out once again as 'lost' groupmates looked for each other, questions were raised regarding what we should do for the assignment etc. While doreen took up the brave responsibility to coordinated the whole situation.

And so, after an hour or so of discussion and clarification, we got back in our groups, discussed about the assignment task for assignment 2, as well as divided ourselves into another group for assignment 3.

Though the process was nerve-wrecking and tensed, i was gald everything was accomplished by the end of the class. Special thanks our gracious lecturer and class rep for the reminder, my groupmates for their cooperaiton, as well as everyone for making things go smoothly as they were.

Reflection Week 10

Today was quite a day! To start off, we had 5 presentations, all in regards to integrating technology with learning. The titles presented are as follow:

1. Use of technology in teaching & learning (Pushpa Dixit)
2. Brave new digital classroom (Robert J. Blake)
3. Technology profesional development for teachers
4. Internet, technology & teachers
5. Educators and the internet: a case study (Lynne Schrum)

From the presentations i've learnt that integration of technology is absolutely possible, if not crucial for the teaching and learning today. However, to successfully deliver our lessons with the integration of technology requires a great deal of preparation, equipping, suitable pedagogy, as well as the acceptance of learners towards the programme.

To put it simply, teachers today have to be flexible and humble enough to pick up new teaching strategies to cater to the demanding learners. Without doing so, learners with varied learning style would not benefit from the teaching and learning processes.

The next segment of the class was video consultation with Pn Foziah. We showed ma'am our progress of storyboards and had further guidance and advice from ma'am to continue with the prodcution of our video clips.

As for me and my partner, Fendy, we evolved our initial theme of food and racial unity into plainly racial unity. With this simple message, we sought inspiration from a tv commercial by TMnet entitled 'As 1 We Care', as shown below:

As to how we are going to adapt the video and how we are going to present it in our video is for us to know and for you to find out when we are done with our video shoot ;)

While anticipating for our video, i'd like take this opportunity to wish every one of my Muslim friends Selamat Hari Raya, maaf Zahir dan Batin. Enjoy yourselves during the festive season and see you in two weeks time!

Reflection Week 9

Today in class, we were shown several interesting videos from youtube. It was an attractive set induction for the class today as we were glued to the screen, enjoying the scenes flashing before our eyes.

It was after the enjoyment that we were brought back to reality with the instruction to come out with a video production in pairs. Since this is not the first time we were required to crank our creative juices for a video production, we were not quite 'alarmed' by the prospect of being 'directors'. Anyhow, uni life is all about learning through exploring, right?

Together, my partner Fendy and I came up with the initial idea themed 'food and people'. Our idea branched out food from different states in Malaysia, and how these food bring people together.

However, after consulting Pn Foziah with our idea, she guided us to a clearer pathway - Unity in Malaysia through Food. She adviced us to focus more on the issue of unity among the different races in Malaysia, and how food plays a partial role in it.

Our task now is to come out with storyboard next week to show our idea to everyone. Meanwhile, we are looking forward to work on our storyboard, coming with interesting ideas to portray our theme in our video.

Thus, it's time to explore, discover & learn! More of our progress next week.. till then, See ya!

Reflection Week 8

September, 1, morning: Raining cats & dogs!

It's a slow start today, with the cold + damp=cozy weather. It's as if everyone was affected by the weather and was working in slow motion. People are late for class, those who are in class looked groggily, and the progress of class was obstructed by lots of trivial occurrences regarding our assigned assignments.

Ma'am was really upset with the situation as everything is NOT going according to plans. However, though upset, i've observed that she didnt really complain too much, instead, she quickly looked for solutions to solve the problems.

This situation really reminded me that anything could happen in a class. The teacher has to be very receptive to emergency or chaotic situations, at the same time, resourceful enough to handle and solve the problems arisen. Thus, classroom management is as important as the deliverance of lessons.

Of course, it also reminded us as students to listen to instructions in order to ensure all efforts to accomplish tasks or assignments are not futile. We should be responsible enough to inform and be informed with regards to our 'duties'.

Let's all be responsible students!

Although not much solid input has been executed today, i felt i've learnt a whole lot from the incidents that occured. As the saying goes 'mistakes are meant to be learnt'. Whether we're the source of problems, or the victim of problems, it's all part of life and experiences. So live, and let live!

Reflection Week 7

"Without music, life is a journey through a desert" (Pat Conroy)

This week's lecture/class clearly reflects what Conroy has stated above. Music plays a huge role in our lives, and without it, our lives would be that much less colourful and interesting.

The class started off with a lecture by Pn Foziah entitled 'Audio Editing'. From her lecture, i've learnt that audio editing not only helps us correct glitches, create smoother intros and outros, fix accidents, but as a whole, gives us a better audio experience. Ma'am also mentioned that the skill of audio editing is highly sought after by radio stations. (does this mean i can work in a radio station after i master audio editing? tsk-tsk-tsk =p)

However, Ma'am reminded all of us that everyone could edit audios, but creating great sound editing requires 3 essential things: tools, skills and art. Without any one of the things mentioned could lessen the quality of our audio creation or product.

Besides that, Ma'am brought us back inn history to review how tedious it was for people back then to edit audios as they do not have technology to assist them. Softwares like Audiocity now makes our life so much more easier, enriching our experience with all kinds of audio editing functions available within the softwares.


Last but not least, the most important highlight that caught my attention was this phrase on the last slide of Ma'am's slide: 'Be smart and BACKUP your files!!'. Thanks for the great reminder Ma'am, and i'm looking forward to tackling those tasks you've set for us!

So till the next week, good luck to all in attempting your tasks & do take care during this season of H1N1 flu epidemic!

Reflection Week 6

Hi people! It's already week 6, nearly half of the semester has passed us by! *gasps*

Time really flies, and before we know it, the semester break is beckoning us to forget all of our worries (read: homework & assignments) for the time being and really have a break from the learning routine.

Right, back onto the track of reflecting today's class. Before starting her lecture, Pn Foziah reminded us not to skip class (referring to ME, but i was truly unwell and did not get an MC from the doctor =P), and to hand in our work in time (referring to the FxFoto task). Oh, btw, FxFoto's reallly fun! Thanks for exposing us to the software ma'am! =)

So, okay we upset ma'am, and we're truly SORRY!~ we didnt know you had a bad morning and i'm sure we just need some 'pushing' at times, but generally, we're good kids ma'am! =P Through this incident, we can see how the interaction of the teacher and learner affects the overall classroom atmosphere. I'm glad to be in Pn Foziah's class as she does not distance ourselves from us, and is completely open about her feelings with us. She sets a good example for us to follow when are handling our classrooms in the future.

To carry on, Pn Foziah presented a lecture regarding e-book. It was a informative lecture which brought us down memory lane as we reminiscence the stories we've heard or read during our childhood years. There were important factors to consider when creating an e-book for children, for example the characters, setting, plot, theme, as well as the components of the book.

As we're to create with our individual e-books, i'm looking forward to the exploration phase as well as the product stage where i would be able to share my product with my friends as well as learn from their products. All the best everyone!

Till we meet again after the semester break (yahoo!), take care of yourselves and be back refreshed and in one piece to face the second part of our semester! =)

Reflection Week 5

Hello again to all fellowe readers! After last week's absence, i'm truly glad to be back to resources class once again! =) It was a phenomenal start this week as we were greeted with a very loud noise..

Yeah, so the fire bell was ringing annoyingly and all of us were trying to ignore it =P But lastly, Pn Foziah 'ordered' us to evacuate the building, or else we'll get burned! Then it dawned to me that there'll be a fire drill demonstration!

Contradictly, we did not evacuate the building as portrayed in the image above.. some of us used the lift (hey, big no-no during a real fire!), while most of us were 'swaying' our way down the stairs, chat-chatting and taking our own sweet time. (bad bad example i know =P)

The scene was almost like the one depicted above, but the funny thing was, i saw some girls started to open up their umbrellas while the firemen were demonstrating. Imagine, opening your umbrellas during a real fire.. Amusing!

However light i try to put things, i knew deep down in my heart that some time in the future, i'd be the one explaining to my students how to evacuate a fire safely, how to use the fire extinguisher and things to be aware of in case a fire happens.

** ** ** ** ** ** **

Fire drills aside, we were back in our computer lab to start the week's work. This week, we were assigned to work in groups of 6-7 for assignment 3: coming up with technology teaching aids related to the KBSR curriculum.

I'm working with a fun bunch of people: Firdaus (our leader!), Taufiq, Fafa, Riena, Syima & Dhaya. We divided the types of teaching aids and i got 'edited pictures'. I believe that there's much room for this kind of teaching aid in current teaching and learning processes.

With technology so widespread and common nowadays, we must catch up with the trend and adapt and apply all kinds of teaching methods and strategies that involve technology in order to fulfill the needs of our learners.

p/s: oh, guess what, Pn Foziah just told us that we're FORBIDDEN to use any pictures/videos that has SNAKES! haha, Puan's is snake phobic.. poor Puan. Ssssssss.. =P