Bring them ON BOARD!

Assalamualaikum beautiful people,

Phew. Finally! Well, first and foremost I’d like to say thank you to Madam Rose for providing all of us this opportunity to share amazing information that I still am trying to absorb till now. Great platform for us, future teachers to just be at each other’s throat (for the better I hope :P) and give our two cents.

Talking bout current trends that is taught in the classroom nowadays, I would like to take a more personal approach and share with ya’ll how my highschool, St. George’s Girls’ School,  has taken initiatives trying to incorporate new teaching methods. I know Madam Rose did mention about not being all wordy and lengthy but ARGHHH I can’t help it! So forgive me for this one post? Promise you it’ll be an interesting one? *shrugs* I bet everyone have heard of exchange students, no? What bout exchange teachers!? AHAAA..Yes. I know right! It actually exist. I don’t exactly know how the process are, but when I was schooling, the school would actually receive foreign teachers from Australia, New Zealand etc. And they would teach at my school for few months. And no, they did not teach English as what you tought. They actually taught other subjects like mathematics and sciences subjects because those subjects were also taught in English as well.

When I was in Form 4, I had this Australian teacher teaching me Biology for a few months. I remember how the whole class would be so hyped and excited whenever we realise it’s gonna be her period. What I would like to focus here is, there was never a dull, when-is-this-class-gonna-end-Im-gonna-die-soon moment every single time we had our session with her. It was so interactive and the class was constantly noisy. The thing is, we actually did not have the need to jot down anything she said because she made it easy for us in a way that we could absorb it easily and effective as well. But also she did not allow us to do so. Thank god it was a she because if she turns out to be a hot HE, I don’t think my brain (or any of my friends’) would be able to absorb ANYTHING AT ALL. And the accent definitely helped as we would just gape at her talking lol.. And everytime the lesson starts, she would have this quiz to recall what we learned during the previous class and anyone who guessed it right would receive a gift she brought from Aussie. So yeahh, you could imagine how barbaric we were trynna get em.

Contrary to what some people say that we should not bring in foreign teachers to teach English and such, I think it is a good idea because students can actually USE English and communicate with these teachers as this is the only way they would wanna be heard and interactive with. Say if it is a local teacher, Im not saying the tendency to actually speak in English will not be there but it is very minimal as students are aware of the fact that the teachers know other languages like Malay and will try use it on them and get away with it. So the chances for these students to speak in English will be dampened with local teachers but will not be severe with foreign teachers. And it will not only be beneficial for students but also for the foreign teachers because they could actually experience the local culture and learn a thing or two about it. They could go back and tell everyone about it. Well, Im just gonna cut it short and let ya’ll watch this amazing documentary that Majalah Tiga had pretty much covered. It is not the same exact situation that I faced but the whole concept on foreign teacher is there.

ENJOY! 

Yours Truly,

SitiMuzlifah.