The end of New Beginning... A start of a New Chapter!

Hi All,

It's our last week together! Gosh!! Mixed feelings!! Glad that it's ending so no more datelines to catch and no more stress trying to get internet access! SO SAD!!! As I know that it'll be so difficult to keep in touch but we will try won't we??!! I will definitely try! I have learned so much from so many helpful, knowledgeable and sincere friends and teachers!! I thank you all for being who you are and being there always!

This course has help me look at things differently! I have definitely benefited from being part of this course!This is my FIRST online course ever and I look forward to many many more! I really feel like a student again, having to meet datelines and to complete tasks and assignments! This really keeps me young and wanting to learn more. Yes! Jodi, you are right I have more to learn and I can't wait to. Though it is my first online course ever, with the help and guidelines given by everyone, have made it an easy first time for me!

To share a little secret with all of you, among all my colleagues, I am considered one of teh most IT savvy person in my school. But I am obviously not! I am so thankful to be selected to be part of this wonderful course. Through this course, I got to know so many new online tools. USEFUL online tools!! I think from week 1 itself I was already expose to google document and wiki! Geezz... I heard about them but never knew what were they for and never had anyone showing me how I could use them. As we progress, I learn even more useful tools like blackboard, ANVILL, Rubistar, Blogger and many many more. I would need to look at the class wiki again to list down all those wonderful tools. But most of all, I think I got to explore some of them and thought of how I could use them in my classroom to enhance or help teaching and learning more effectively.

Being back to school was great as I got to read, understand and respond to articles, journals, papers and others. I must say I it made me feel intelligent! LOL! I always love to read other's work, especially those related to my profession. Like the article on MI... I've learnt that when I was still a teacher trainee. It's not something new but it was definitely great to 're-visit' it again! To read it again at this age and with working and real-life experiences, I could make sense of it better and I could think of ways how I could use it with my own students. The articles about how technology can help with teaching in the classroom were definitely mind-blowing for me when I first read it! Yes I knew how I can use It to help enhance my teaching. But what got my attention was that it's no longer confine to the 4 walls of the classroom. IT or technology has brought teaching to a different level. It can now happen in virtual space!!! WOW! Isn't that amazing??!!!! Yes! That is what all of us having been doing for the past 10 weeks! Learning in a virtual classroom! I love technology and now I love it MORE!

I hope and I will do my very best to use the knowledge I have gained from the course in my teaching from now on. LIke I said, there are many useful tools out there but as teachers, we need to explore and evaluate them before introducing them in class. In my report, one of the tools I hope to use is Blogger and I agree totally with Jodi that I may want to save that for a more advance class rather than using it with my really weak students. Jodi suggested that a simple WebQuest would be more suitable with my weak class and I think that is just what I'll do!

End of week 9!!!! A relief... finally submitted my final project report!!!

Arrrggggg!!!!! I nearly miss the dateline for the final project report!!! Phew!!! I nearly but didn't!! I think this would be how my students would feel when they have datelines... Worst still it wasn't because I haven't finish my report but it was because of the internet connection!!! How I feel relief now and am able to catch my breath. 

Let me than thank my ever wise partner Ruta for the great comments and help with my project. But kind of sad that I wasn't able to show her my corrected version. Reading my partner's report made me realised that I am still a 'baby' in the business of webskills and ICT in the classroom. I am ever so glad that I was given the opportunity to be part of this class and most of all to meet so many experienced and generous classmates and teachers who are always willing to share ideas and comment. 

As for this week, I really got to review and re-think about what I have done and what were some of the 'hic-cups' and how I can improve and implement changes so that things would work more affectively. I also got to think how learning style and multiple intelligence play an crucial role in helping us teachers to know our students better and thus plan better lessons.

An adventure of a life time!!

First of all, I want to thank my friends and teacher; especially Ruta, Georgia, Poncho and Jodi, for their wonderful and always motivating comments on my post last week. No matter long or short, those comments have become my strength and motivation! Yes Ruta! Teaching is ever so challenging nowadays and it is an adventure to me so far!! Anyone who thinks that being a teacher is a boring career than they are really missing out the adventure of their life to be able to change with time and to be able to cope with all the ups and downs of everyday little things! 

This week, as ever, has been a great 'quest'! I am so amaze with all the new technology I've learned from my own classmate and partner but most of all from our guest Jeff Magoto, the creator of ANVILL. As time passes, I realised that I have so much to learn and I have a lot to do as I discover more and more useful online tools! ANVILL is definitely a great tool to be use in any classroom. I can see how effective it can be. However, I have also my reply to Jeff that there are 2 main problems to my situation which are no computers and no internet access. I really do hope that this problem will soon be overcome with the help of my school admin. 

This week I learn to create test and crossword puzzle online and print out for classroom used. I am truly grateful and thankful to be part of this course as I get to discover and learn new useful online tools every week! I was just thinking how good it it if I could easily create a test or quiz online for free and 'ta da'.. this week we are asked to explore exactly what I was wishing for! The sweet fruit of my adventure! Maybe Jodi and Celeste were reading my mind!!! Thank you teachers for including such useful and user-friendly tools in out lessons. 

This week I also get to dream a little with what online tools I would want to use in my class if I can. I chose a few; blogger, wiki and nicenet. As I feel that these 3 tools allow my students some freedom and at the same time also require them to be discipline. I really do hope what I have vision today will be a fact in the near future. I really would like to be at par with the IT era in teaching and I see that the use of technology will be a great and effective way for teaching to 'evolve'! Let's hang on tight and venture into this world of knowledge. And hand-in-hand, we march together to into the future of technology!

Phewww.... End of Week 7!!

Woah! week 7.. hanging on! Ok let me see...  This week I started to carry out the changes I mentioned in the previous week. I have tried to use powerpoint and other multimedia in my class for my weak students. And as I predicted, the students love the use of videos and photo story. However, this does not mean that it was a success. Many students still can't understand the words used in my photo story as well as the accent of the speaker of the video which I downloaded from 'youtube'. But nonetheless, even the really weak ones were glued to the screen looking at the pictures and animations. 

Since, visual media is great  in grabbing my students' attention, I feel that I can use this method to make drilling a bit fun for them. I will try out using different picture but the same word and maybe instead of a sentence, I will start with one word. 

This week I read about learners' autonomy and also one computer option. I read about how even with one computer (which usually will be the teacher's laptop) we can still make our lessons interesting and use that computer to carry out many different activities. Most importantly, the sole computer is used as an administrative tool where by the teacher uses it to prepare the lesson, to carry out the lesson and also to receive feedback and comment from the students through email or blog or even facebook. 1 computer is not much but certainly good enough to create more and help enhance learning. Susan Gaer has definitely given many useful and easy to achieve ideas using the internet. I do hope to create my own WebQuest or at least start with it soon.

Learners' autonomy isn't something new actually. It is only now that we talk about it more. This is to cater to the ever changing and ever demanding needs of our learners. We can no longer just teach the old-school way; chalk and talk, as learners nowadays require more to become better learners due to the many distraction of our modern world. In my post, I simply love the way Holec has defined the term as he describe it as 'the ability to take charge of one;s learning.' Now as teachers and planners, we are aware of this. But to me I feel that the students should also be aware of this. And this, like Shue in his article, should not only be allow to take charge of their own learning when they are in college or university, they should be expose to it even when they are in primary school. This is so students will be independent learners instead of depending too much on the teacher and when they are in college, they find it difficult to cope with assignment and course reading where students have to be independent to read and be ready for class. 


Time have changed. So we need to change to ensure that we as teachers would be able to 'equip' our students with all the necessary skills not to just get a job but able to survive and excel in their profession. To do so, we must be ready to change and adapt to the demands of time, but students too need to be expose to the different requirement which they too have to take charge and be responsible for their own doings. They can't solely depend on the teachers and schools, they too have to play their role.  They need to see the importance to learn the language and how by learning the language they would be able to move further in their future. 

I think with or without technology, the teacher plays a very crucial role in helping a child to learn, no matter what subject it is. Many students would excel in a subject just because of the teacher. The teacher can help make the student aware of his or her potential and guide them to the correct or suitable path which they student will be able to shine and achieve his or her full potential. But I must also admit that with technology, the teacher is able to go further by helping not only the good ones but also the weaker ones. Technology allows the teacher to use and include many other interesting methods and ways to make lesson and activities fun and effective which was not possible in the old days.


I strongly feel that teaching will change in many ways in the future and we need to learn these new ways and be ready for more changes. Myself and what I am doing now is the best example. I never thought of I would be learning in a virtual classroom where I am to discuss topic and issue online. I also never expected that I would one day be writing a blog as part of a course requirement. It's simply amazing how the teaching and learning process has changed. I can only foresee more changes and that technology will definitely be a huge part of the teaching and learning field in the years to come. It will be a huge part BUT NEVER to take over the role of the teacher!

End of Week 6... still sick!!!

Hope you won't mind the pun!It has certainly been a very long week for me. Nonetheless, life still goes on and things still have to be done. I have yet to start much... I think the best way to help my weak class read is using PBL. I will start getting students to talk about what are the types or kind of reading materials they would like to read. I think by doing (discussing) so I know students will at least show some interest in wanted to read. I think when they get to decide what they want to read, they would show better interest. Like when I gave them the choice to borrow any books from my reading box fr their reading activity, though it took 30 minutes for them to decide which book they wanted to read nonetheless all of them took 1 book from the box and started reading. 

I hope that by using a computer, it will attract them to participate more in reading. as they are all IT savvy and they definitely react well to a computer-assisted lesson. I do hope I will be able to make my weak students read and at the end of the day would have a list of at least 100 new words which they will be able to use in their writing. 

 Week 6 offer even more things for me to learn. I find the most useful of all is learning about Blackboard. It is similar to Nicenet but I personally think that Blackboard offers more. Reading most of the articles, I realised that I not only have a lot to learn but a lot more to master before I can 'take off'. I hope to be doing more with my project and will be able to record some if not any changes with my students.

Bye Bye Week 4.. Here comes Week 5!!!!

week just ended a few hours ago... I must say my prayers to thank God that I am still here! I Must agree with many of my friends that I've learnt so much in Week 4. Many friends have shared their opinion and useful websites which most of us would be able to use in our classroom.. 

The 2 articles on using technology in the classroom made me think more. I feel that it is so true that there isn't 1 website or technlogy that would be the correct one instead, as teachers, we need to adapt what is 'workable' and use it appropriately.. it is almost a trial error kind of process. and with different students, we may need to use different techology both online as well as offline when necessary. 

With this course now, I find myself constantly thinking of how I can improve what I am doing currently. With all these new technology and websites, I really hope to apply them into my teaching and learning of my students in the near future. Even if it's just the use of simple things like Delicious.com or even google documents. I would also like to use wiki to create a class wiki with my students where they can share information and all. 

To all my classmates, wiching you all a great start to WEEK 5!! Let's all work together for a better tomorrow! 

Semoga berjaya! [/sir/more/ga/  /bur/jar/ya/] - My national language Bahasa Malaysia which means Wishing you success!!!

Week 4... Almost drowning... BUT keeping on STRONG!

It's Friday here already. I have only managed to respond to 2 of the tasks and 1 more to go. I need to think and plan a lesson using technology. Geezzzz... what is wrong with me??!! I've done it so many time but why am I having problem starting it?? I simply can't decide what to do and where to start!!!

There's always this questions or to be more specific, a reality, in my head! How am I going to do it when there's is no proper equipment and facilities??? Would getting students preparing powerpoint slide at home consider as using technology in the classroom? 

Despite all the other 'common' problems like students' lack of interest in reading and writing, time constrain, being exam-oriented, not habit of speaking English, feeling of shame and isolation by peers when use English, English is a superior language and many more, the foremost major problem is that school are not equipped with technology, so how are teachers suppose to use technology in their teaching and learning process? When a teacher download materials from the internet and use the materials in the classroom, is this consider as using technology? Is this a technology enhanced lesson?

I don't really want to change the world but I do feel that this is a problem I can't solve as a teacher. I can only do so much to help my students and at times, I resort to conventional teaching methods as they are easier and manageable but mostly BORING!

THINK! THINK! THINK!.... What to do? What can I do?.....

tHe EnD of DeLiCiOuS WeEk 3!

I am so happy to be with such motivating and helpful classmate! This was indeed another busy week. Like Poncho, I find that I am learning more than I expected to being in this course. We had 3 things to do this week. The first was to look at speaking skills. As I have mentioned in my post in nicenet.org, in my country, speaking skill is not given enough emphasis due to many reason and the main being the fact that teachers are exam-oriented therefore, we would focus more on reading and writing, 2 skills tested in our major exams. Reading Miller's (n.d.), I was reminded of the importance of speaking and that we spend most of our time speaking. But why than speaking is being neglected in our classroom? 

Reading Gong's (2002) article on using CALL in language teaching and learning also gave me a better understanding about reasons why it is difficult, at times, to have well-develop software or program for teaching speaking. I must agree that it would need a great amount of funding in order to develop a realistic and interactive software which all of us can use in our classroom. Besides being realistic and authentic, there's also the question of suitability. I am talking about the accent used. As Malaysia is a Commonwealth country, the Queen's English is used but than our society at large is expose to American English through movies, songs and etc. I guess that is a small matter but a matter which many would use as a political interest in my country. Just imagine, even the teaching of maths and science has become an issue here just because many city parents insist to continue the program but rural folks do not want to simply because of competency and the importance of English language for the rural folks.

I am still trying to include the use of CALL or web skills in my classroom but than I am faced with a major problem of availability of computers and internet access. But than I am sure we are able to use activities which we can download in our classroom to help enhance and expose students to the abundance of resources on the net. Besides that, I would also like to use emails with my students. I think this will help them with spelling and grammar. This will be a small and first step in implementing the use of web skills in my classroom. 

Finally, I can answer some of my own questions about Delicious.com. It is so useful and I can now arrange all my links into stacks and I can easily access them on the net wherever I am. I hope to share more links with others and hopefully some of them would be useful to all my classmates and teachers. 

Lastly, I got to look at some past projects. I am so impressed with how teachers all over the world are so motivated and how they are so detailed in their observation. Looking at their project, 2 in particular, I am reminded of how it was my dream too be be a great teacher. Now I have so many ideas what to do with my class when CALL is concerned. I really hope that I will be able to plan and make things happen, not this year, next year! I truly appreciate all my classmates encouragement and words of wisdom too! This is the very reason why I am still teaching and still a teacher trying to touch lives despite all the negative things happening around me. Thanks to all and good luck too to all my friends and teachers!!!

Delicious Week 3...

Now, where do I start? Delicious! Still trying to figure out how do I upload links on my Delicious page? I am still exploring...

Communication.....communication....and communication...I just returned from my part-time job at one of the local universities, here. I must say that today's lesson is kind of depressing. Perhaps it is due to the fact that I'm have not been sleeping well, lately or perhaps students' reactions to the lesson.  Miller (n.d) pinpointed that most of the time we spend speaking compare to reading, listening and writing. It has come to my attention to the response on this week response. I agree that we speak all the time. There's nothing stopping us from speaking to others and even to our own selves. In Malaysia, generally, the main focus in the classroom is spend on reading and writing. Since English is not the official language and the fact that our education system focuses a lot on examination, teachers and students aim only to excel in 'jotting down' the correct answer on the pieces of papers given. Thus, the aspect of speaking English is much neglected. Today, my students were required to deliver a speech on a topic which interest them such as 'Types of food in Malaysia, My Dream Holiday, Benefits of having Good Personalities' and more. They were given 2 weeks to prepare their speech and I helped correct their grammar and language a week before. They even get to send me their corrected speech through email but yet only 2 out of my 30 students could effectively and successfully deliver their speech. In previous lessons, I have demonstrated to them how they need to delivery their speech and I have also given them input on the style and language. So where did I go wrong or what have I not do to fully prepare my students for the task?

A reason that I think is the major cause of this is that English is not use at all in their daily activities and that English is only a subject they take to get a degree. But eventually, all students will have to sit for an English test and pass in order to be able to graduate. Yet, many of them view English as not important and unnecessary.

Therefore my dear friends and teachers, what should I do or what can I do to help raise that speaking English is important and it is a 'valuable' too.

Opps! Forgot...

Oh yes! I have another interesting site which I love as well. It's fun and suitable for beginners to help with grammar! Hope you'll try it out!!!

http://wackytales.com/

Good night all!!

End of Week 2

Phew! I never thought that it would be so hectic and packed to be back learning! But it's definitely FUN! The weeks started with describing our target students and I think I wrote a bit longer than I should. However, I really can't just describe my students and not talk about some of the major problems that I face in carrying out my lesson especially when ICT is concerned. Jodi pointed out a very good and realistic point when she said that even before IT or ICT, the world has had many, loads of great teachers. This is an undeniable fact! Something I should always remember. So now my goal is to learn how these technologies can help enhance my lesson and not let them take over my lesson or my students. I should be in-control and I should be the main factor that directly influence my students.

After 12 years of teaching, I kind of lost the idea of being able to write realistic and measurable objectives. The ABCD system is indeed a simple and easy way to always remember how we can write our objective so that others and our students are able to understand what we want to achieve. My teachers' and classmates' comments were extremely useful! Looking at the comments and what my other classmates have done, I was able to write my objective some what easier. I will need guidance and more practice to be able to write proper and better objectives. I strongly recommend to all my other friends in my school to look at the slides provided in our reading so they too can write better objectives for their lessons.

To me the best part of this week was I get to explore the many useful links in www.noodletools.com. At the beginning, I was  kind of lost as there were just too many links and headings. But as I explore further, I find that it is quite easy as long as we know what we are looking for. I love the fact that these links or search engines help us to narrow our search and make it easier for students and teachers to look for resources or specific information they need.

Here are some links which I find useful:
1)  http://infomine.ucr.edu/ - Search annotated academic sites and subject databases

2)  http://www.idebate.org/portal/ - Browse or search a debate topic database with pro/con arguments

3)  http://www.biography.com/people - Search 25,000+ biographies by name, keyword and profession

4)  http://www.multcolib.org/homework/sochc.html - Links to pro/con on current social issues

5)  http://www.ipl.org/ - Easy-to-navigate, well-annotated directory of librarian-selected Web sites

However, I would like to share some other sites which I normally use to find materials as well as information or to download applications. Here is my list:

1) www.englishforeveryone.org

2) www.download.com

3) http://www.tlsbooks.com/educationalwordsearchpuzzles.htm

4)  http://www.teacher-appreciation.info/Quotations_on_teaching/

5) http://www.myenglishpages.com/

I hope you will find these links useful.


Our 2nd week is almost over, and I am sure that there will be more to learn. I look forward to share and learn from all my friends. All the best to all of you! Thank you to Jodi and Celeste for another great weak and another 8 more weeks to come!

It has been a great 2 weeks!

End of Week 1

It's almost the end of the week.. Actually it's another 15 minutes... but here in Malaysia its already Monday almost noon.. I must say again that it has been a very exciting week.

I thought things would start slow and eventually speed up but in our case, its been 'fast and furious'! I love it! This very week itself, I became friends with so many people from all over the world. But it is so strange (good way of strange) that though we are from different part of the world and come from different background and culture yet we all share so many things in common. We all love knowledge and we love sharing knowledge with others.

Other thing I learn which I think important is that we get to participate in everything. We all get a say in decisions and we get to say what we want to say and learn to cooperate with each other despite all the differences we have. I simply just love that as I don't normally get to do so in my work place.

I look forward to more new experiences to learn. Thank you to all my 'classmates' and both my teachers, Jodi and Celeste for all the guidance.

A new beginning.... Week 1

Gosh! I must say that it has be a such a hectic but fun week. Everything started so fast and everyone in the class are so active!  And what a mixture of people from all over the world! It's all so exciting.

This is my first blog. My friend, Audrey Wiles, has been trying to get me started with one for so long but sadly, I never did... until NOW! Yeah! I am here and I am writing a blog. It seems easy at the moment and I hope it won't be too difficult as time passes.