3rd Week

This week’s class is totally different from the previous classes. Usually Pn.Foziah will deliver all the input and we just need to listen and understand, but this week we were required to work in groups and present our task in power point presentation. This would be the first presentation since we entered University Malaya, so everyone was really excited.

This week’s chapter is ‘Working with young language learners’. We were divided into 6 groups and each of the group deal with different subtopics. As future primary school teachers, these topics are very important and will be very useful as we will be dealing with young learners. Due to time constrain, only two groups were able to present today. Their topics were ‘1.3 - Children’s capacity for indirect learning’ and ‘1.6 – The instinct for interaction and talk’.

From the first group’s presentation I realised that indirect learning is very crucial for learners especially the younger ones. Indulging them in indirect learning would be fundamental to develop their vocabulary, pronunciation or even their knowledge about phrases. In my opinion, making the pupils to learn indirectly or naturally is much more effective compared to the normal chalk and talk phenomena (direct learning). Indulging pupils in guessing games such as ‘Hang-man’ and ‘Charade’ would be suitable to develop young learners language as it encourages critical thinking as well as creativity which indirectly profits pupils’ learning.

Meanwhile, the second group presented on ‘The instinct for interaction and talk’. This group did a very good job as they gave definition for the words ‘instinct’, ‘interaction’, ‘talk’ and finally an overall definition of the subtopic. Starting their presentation with simple definitions enabled me to understand and cope with their presentation. From my point of view, children love to talk and there is no point for a teacher to control them from talking. Teachers should actually encourage talking as it can develop pupils’ vocabulary, pronunciation and intonation. Therefore, I would say that teacher’s job is not to control pupils from talking but to make the talking more educational and beneficial. This can be done by assigning pair or group works. When pupils work in groups, there will be more chances for them to interact, communicate and share ideas which will eventually develop their language proficiency.

2nd Week

2nd week of PBEY3102, I am ready to accept and absorb new things from today’s lecture. As the first week, this week seems to have its speciality. This week we were introduced to ‘Touch typing’, Skydrive, and Moyea. All the three things introduced this week is also unfamiliar to me. As usual I have to listen carefully to Pn. Foziah’s lecture in order to understand these things.

Firstly, ‘Touch tying’ is a typing skill without looking at the keyboard. Typing without looking at the keyboard? OMG, another herculean task for me. I even make mistakes when I look at the keyboard but now I have to learn to type without looking at the keyboard. How am I going to type without looking at the keyboard? I was really threatened because I could hardly type without looking at the keyboard. Luckily, Pn. Foziah taught us on how and where to place our fingers on the keyboard in order to type without looking at the keyboard. Besides, she also gave us the ‘Typing Test’ software in order to practise typing using both hands and also without looking at the keyboard.

Next, we were introduced to Skydrive. Skydrive is a place where we can store our files and share it with our friends.

On the other hand, by using Moyea, we can create and customize web player which can be embedded in multiple platforms like blogs, websites, forums and so on.

Lastly, we were given a survey questionnaire. The survey was basically about our skills and ability in applying and using the current technological development.

From the today’s lecture and the questionnaire, I realised that, I need to learn more in order to be aligned with current technological development.

1st Week

Name: Kumaresen A/L Mahalingam

Matric No: PEH080022

PBEY 3102- Using and Developing Resources for the ESL Classroom, this is the only thing that I know about this course.

I kept on wondering what am I going to learn in this course since the day I registered for the course. Finally, on the first class of PBEY3102, the mystery that was wondering me was finally revealed. Our lecturer, Pn. Foziah gave brief description of the course and she also introduced us to some new things.

At first I was quite happy because we are going to work more on the computers rather than using paper and pencils, but as the class progresses I was a bit lost.

I was lost because we were asked to create a blog. BLOG???, this word is very familiar to me but frankly speaking I do not know anything about blog except for its spelling..he..he..he.... It took me some time to create the blog and learn to manage it.

Since this course is more to computers and softwares, Pn. Foziah asked us to get at least an 8GB pendrive.

8GB!, the capacity of the pendrive shows how much work we need to carry out later, so friends be READY to start a new adventure.

Next, we were asked to install Adobe Photoshop CS3. I know about this product but never used it, I am very eager to explore it soon.

From the first day’s lecture, I realised that I am far behind compared to the current technological developments and I really hope that I could be aligned with current technological development as well as the progress of this course.