Monday, October 10, 2005

EDU3234 Final Entries


Well to tell you the truth this course was stressful mentally, because I have to produce two academic writing and it really squeeze dry the creative, analytical skills in me. But hey, it was worth it because I have produce two-piece of written paper that I am very satisfy with. I have gone through drafts and drafts and the whole process of trial and error for my assignments, but even though it was “stressful” I think it is a “good stress” because it motivated me to try to do the best that I possibly can, on these two papers. Yes believe it or not, there is such a thing as “good stress”. In fact, good stress even has a name – “eustress” (something every student should learn about =)

Well you have to take what life throws at you and make the best out of it

Well the part of this course I like was during lecture classes and during our presentations of our position paper. I got a lot of input on how to use different kind of material like fables, autobiography, letters and diary as reading materials for students and how to use and adapt these reading texts.

I especially remember how to adapt a Diary as a teaching recourse, because I was the first in class to actually presented an adapted diary as a reading text for students, what I presented was not that good actually the text was ok but my instruction was a bit off and after some correction from Dr. Edwin, I feel I could actually use it when I am teaching. He pointed out how I could get students feedback by way of asking student’s to write a diary, so it was a priceless experience for me. I was the lucky few that got the opportunity to present our work in from of the class.

I actually collected a few of my friends position paper because I think they are interesting to read, they pointed out some interesting points in the text that they are working on. So during our presentation of our position paper, those who are working on interesting topics or texts that of an interest to me, I would ask for a copy from them, so beside my own position paper I have actually a compilations of my friends position paper (on print and in a Floppy disk), but unfortunately not all of them gave me a copy.

To conclude I did a lot of reading in this course that have enrich my mind? Well it definitely opened my mind to use and adapt a variety of text in class. A lot of practical skills was obtain in this course, skills and knowledge that I eventually will need and use, during my teaching. A priceless experience that enriched me as a teacher to be.

To top it all, there is no test for this course at the end of the semester, and I actually score the highest score for the position paper, now that is priceless.

I did some analytical assignments with Dr. Edwin before in my previous few semesters, and I always manage to do well, but to score the highest in the class for the last paper with Dr. Edwin that is priceless. To me I prove that I improve a lot and getting the highest score from Dr. Edwin made it all that wonderful.

Thursday, October 06, 2005

Approval


My supervisor couldn’t make it for our meeting yesterday, and out of the six of us only me and two other show up for the meeting , probably because yesterday was the start of the fasting month.

Today however Dr.fauziah had a meeting with all of us and well I was late for class because of this meeting but the good news was that she APPROVE my out-line with some minor clarifications on the points I have work on, but other than that It was all Good.

This Monday I need to past up my research paper on the topic I was doing, so with just some fine tuning to my otherwise completed research paper I am ready to go. Now I just need to work on the cover of the page this weekend shouldn’t be to hard.

Tuesday, October 04, 2005

The Sample Paper a Life Saver

To be honest, I have the points for my research paper but I really don’t know how to put it in a systematic, presentable way. Luckily for me there was a sample paper given for us to refer to.

When writing my research paper I don’t know how to “kick-start” the paper. I type out my topic and have my out line in my hand, but for some weird reason I was blank on how to go about it? What should I start first? How do I start?
The sample paper helps me get a rough idea on how to go about writing it and I fine it very useful to have when writing my research paper. It helps me focus on what to write first and whenever I got stuck on the way I would refer to it.

The implication for my research paper took me some time to construct it, and if it was not for the sample paper I would probably still be scratching my head thinking, how to do it.

Sunday, October 02, 2005

The research paper Feedback?


I have decided not to wait for my supervisor’s feedback on the new out-line of my research paper and start writing out my research paper.

The reason is very simple; I am not going to sit around on a Sunday morning doing noting but wait for her approval first

This research paper is a 3000 words paper, I feel restless just waiting without doing any thing. At first when working on the point for my research paper, I was a bit sceptical about coming up with enough points to do a 3000 words write-up but as I analyse the text more and more point was discovered, what luck for once I feel driven to write a lot maybe it’s because I did so well on my position paper that I hope to do the same with this research paper as well.

Anyway they say the mind is a muscle, the more you work out on it the better it gets. I hope mine is still in optimum state after days of working until the wee late hour of the night.

Saturday, October 01, 2005

Do the “feminist” thing


I decided to do the “feminist” reading thing; well I did a Freudian reading for my position paper might as well do some feminist reading. Since she like to stress on how write uses masculine term “man” to represent both gender and all that stuff in class, she would probably enjoy reading how the literary text in the secondary schools actually have these generic term and how women are stereotype in these literary text and how sexist language, sexual bias and all that is found in the secondary school literary text.

This would be my second new out line. She ask me to work on my existing out-line, but I am going to give her a new one that is totally different from the first one I hope she is ok with this. It is quite near to the due date of this research paper better don’t do so much changes and work on more progress.