Saturday, May 28, 2005

help :(

the long awaited weekend is finally here!

i was shocked, scared and stoned @ the 9am lecture today for Field Practicum 2.1. It was an undescribable feeling.. I was worried, confused, and my mind kept thinking about what to do and how to do it but no answers came because i didn't know what to do and how to go about doing it.

i'm talking about 3 lesson plans for each subject - Art & Craft and Music & Movement.

Also, i've got to decide on an age group.. of which i've got to get along pretty well once the first 2 weeks are up. In fact, i have to bathe and dress and undress the kids on my first visit - sth i have never done before! I sincerely hope and pray that there'll be someone to guide me.

I'm in a dilemma because there are pros and cons of taking different age groups. if i pick the older kids, say age 4 and above, its good that we can communicate with each other using verbal language, but the sad part is, i'll have to chase after these children. Also, Child Development 2.1 concentrates on Infants & Toddlers this semester, so age 4-6 will not be linked to it.

However, if i choose to teach the younger kids, age 2-3, i might have problems communicating with them because i'll have to learn to listen out for the meaning to their cries since they are not fully developed in terms of their linguistic abilities. Something that amazes me is their ability to understand the things that u say and that they cannot verbalize themselves. Depending on each individual child, I might encounter experiences of biting amongst this group of children too. Also, i would have to expect a sing-a-long session with my words being the only listenable & understandable ones because the most most of these children can pronnounce are very short words & small sounds like A E I O U. And i wonder how am i gonna introduce myself to these children. I'm not exactly a teacher yet, and they won't understand what i'm saying!! And if they don't understand what i'm saying, it will take them a longer time to get to know me, which means they will take a longer time to learn to trust me = problems with handling the class.

We have to cover transitions as well.. and a huge amount of classroom management (which is the KEY to teaching a group of 25 kids!). This freaks me out because firstly, it is impossible to establish rules & regulations with toddlers. we can only set limits for them, but the wordy stuff should be left out. Also, i have to improve on my volume!!! My voice is not only low, it is also soft especially when i'm nervous!!!

argh.. it is also frustrating to note that our lecturer is not exactly the friendliest person u'd love to meet. she's stern, but has a sense of responsibility towards her job (which is - forcing us to teach well). This course hardly teaches me how to teach, in fact, I think i'm on my own in tons of things. We have no experience in creating lesson plans for art & craft, etc, what's more handling a class for REAL this time round and being assessed on it?

One thing which bothered me for a minute today was sth that lecturer said. It went something like this: "We have to carry out our threats like when we work with children. So similarly, u can ask your seniors, when i say that i'll close the door, i WILL close it". Which means that she means what she says and "don't play play". But i kinda felt that HEY! in the first place, we're not even supposed to threaten children!

thankfully, i'm just glad that she was perfectly frank AND honest about something that shows that she actually RECOGNISES (though not necessarily understand) what's the current situation of the new Year 2 students: "Year 2 is your BIGGEST struggle". *raises both hands enthusiastically!* I fully agree!

I am getting tons of keeto-kisses *mosquito-bites* at the moment, they're really greedy! one bite isn't enough.. i'm done with complaining anyway, so time to tata. toodles!
bee at 4:30 PM