Monday, July 26, 2010

Children's Learning






The time has been passed so fast that we are now already in the third week attending our resources lesson. For today’s lesson, we have first been given the text book and were assigned into groups according to the number that we have numbered ourselves randomly. I was in group with the members of ‘ONE MALAYSIA’ as all races such as Malay, Chinese, Indian, and Kadazan are all in my group. This showed a harmonious and pleasant scene where we all communicated and discussed about the issue or the topic assigned by Puan Foziah through English language even though we are all from other races. This shows that skin colour is not an obstacle. It does not keep us apart. In fact, English has bounded us together effectively. I would say, this is a good sign to see, isn’t? Do you agree?



Well, today we are assigned on the main topic of “Working with young language learners” overally, which we were then assigned to take a sub-topic for each small group. It was an interesting topic for us to focus on as it involves a variety of issues that are worth looking into by us, the future teacher. This is because this topic will enable us to understand more on the young children’s language development as well as their way of learning second language. Thus, transform us into a more effective and understanding teacher in the future.

The first group that has been presented today was on the sub topic of “Children’s capacity for indirect learning.” The presentation was good and effective as the group members have included a lot of examples for the types of language games such as charade, hangman, guessing game as well as broken telephone together with the c o l o u r f u l pictures inserted aside on the power point presentation which enabled us to be more focus and comprehend the input better. Besides, it also can be seen that the group members have put in a lot of effort in explaining their sub-topic to us. This can be seen especially in their presentation where a video was shown on how the teacher instilled the sense of curiosity in the young children by distributing one group of the children to have one big pumpkin. This activity was then followed by the teacher asking the children to open up the pumpkin and asked them to take out the things that are in the pumpkin. I believe this is quite an effective method to be used in order to stimulate the children’s interest as the children in the video were seen excited when they are given the pumpkin and they were actually discussing among themselves on what are inside the big pumpkin. Well, this is a kind of indirect learning as the children were seen playing around with the pumpkin on the surface, but they are actually in the learning process as the teacher carried out the teaching session by using the pumpkin as the realia.

The second group has also presented on their sub-topic today which entitled “The instinct for interaction and talk.” INTERACTION is an important word especially in the classroom nowadays as it is now student-centered. The students should be encouraged to do the talking all the time. (NOT by the teacher practicing chalk and talk ANYMORE!) It is vital for the children to talk all the time as it is to be believed that the children will be able to construct their own knowledge better if they are given chances to express their opinions or any doubts on the lesson learned in the class. It would be more effective if the children are given group works that they need to cooperate and discuss among the members in completing the task given by their teacher. While the group was presenting on the topic, our lecturer has also added on that interaction engages different students at different level. Therefore, as a future teacher, we must always remember that “Each and every student is different.” We must always make sure that the children are learning and engage actively in their preference way.



The other groups have not yet presented and will be presented on next week. I am looking forward for next week presentation. I am sure there are still much more that we need to learn as it is a very interesting topic for us to look upon in improving ourselves a more successful teacher.

So, see you next week. Enjoy yourself.

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