Today was my first official day as a practicum student in SMK Taman Desa, KL. Nothing much had been done today.
As soon as we arrived, we met the Senior Assistant Teacher, Miss Nur Elisa Tee, who talked to us for a while and later introduced us to the teachers and students during the assembly.
After the assembly ended, we had our briefing with Miss Nur Elisa Tee, who I found very welcoming and approachable. She shared a lot of things which were very relevant and useful to our development as teacher trainees. Then, we met Miss Michelle Liew, the Head of English Panel. Just like Miss Tee, she was very nice and helpful. She told us that an effective teaching should be clear, inspiring and dynamic, with a balance between firmness and fun. She also reminded us to be careful not to get so friendly with the students or else, they will 'eat' us up (well, not literally)! I’ll remember that! In the afternoon, we attended my first teacher meeting. It was interesting. Yes, interesting. We were quite sleepy though. Hehe..
I was assigned to Form 4K2 and Form 4K5 English. Well, originally I was given Form 4K2 and Form 4K4. However, when I went to see Mr. Teh Wee Liang, the English teacher (who was also my super2 senior from Cohort 1) for Form 4K4 to find out what topics he had already taught, where we should pick up and other stuff related to the class, he was very surprised you know! He said, 'No, no...You can't teach this class. I'll go talk to Mrs. Lau'. Of course I was very curious and worried. He then explained to me that Form 4K4 was a problematic class. They were like the students of 3D Class in Gokusen or the students of Room 203 in the Freedom Writers. So, he said he won't let me take the class because he knew that the students would definitely 'attack' and 'challenge' me and there's no way that I could handle them. Sounds scary, right?
The funny thing was, I wanted to say 'Please give me the class. Who knows I can be that teacher who can inspire them to change?''. HAHAHA..ya, I know what you would say about that. I sounded too ambitious and poyo! Haha..maybe I watched too many movies/series such as Gokusen, Great Teacher Onitsuka, Freedom Writers, and many other and therefore I believed I would have ways to handle those students.
But of course it did not happen. Like I said previously, I was given Form 4K2 and From 4K5 English class. Form 4K5 was the last class out of 7 classes. The level of proficiency was quite low, but discipline-wise, it was better than Form 4K4. That's what Mr. Teh told me.
Anyway, I should be grateful for getting both classes. It was their destiny to be my first group of students and it was their future which I should be responsible to for the next couple of months. Through this practicum, I hope to gain firsthand experience with all the aspects that must come together in order to for me to be a great teacher for the next forty years. Insya-Allah :)
