Absence

Am apologetic for the absence. Was too tied with my uni exams as well as tons of school work. Almost drowned with work...
What a relieve...now that I had completed my 5th Sem exams....hopefully passing with supernatural colours...which I doubt I could. The questions were so alienated from my module..Just keeping my fingers crossed.

On a brighter side, am planning for a short break this weekend. With Fri day off for Labours' Day means a long weekend ahead. Perhaps going for a facial session and a body massage to unwind my tensed muscles. As promise, am taking my boy for a picnic as he has been pestering me to take him to the beach to put his architecture skills into action ~building sand castles.

Busy Bee

Dear readers,
Yours truly is a bit tied up recently....uni exams. Just completed two papers yesterday...another two more to go. Will update my blog as soon as I'm free to do so. Stay tuned.

GROs offer linguistic services

Flirty GROs offer linguistic services

GUEST relations officers (GROs) in Johor Baru are now offering two-in-one services — they not only provide sex but also English lessons, reported Kosmo!
In a bid to remain competitive, the GROs are playing the extra role of English tutors to help clients brush up their skills in the language.
A source said the GROs realised that most of their clients were not fluent in the language and decided to add the extra service to help their clients communicate better in English.
According to the source, the extra service does not have a fixed price and payment was at the discretion of the client.
“After falling for the flirtatious ways of the GROs and the extra English lessons, the client usually comes back to the entertainment centre to seek their services,” he said.

[Quote The Star 1st April 2009]

Hookers give English lessons to supplement their income. Wow...these ladies are playing a dual role as a tutor as well as providing xxx services to their clients. In no time, trained English teachers like us with proper qualifications and certificates would be competing with them. Our "Rice bowl" seems to "shaken a lil bit" with the existence of these GROs.

We English not only teach English to our students but also conduct English tutorials to our fellow colleagues aka Science and Mathematics teachers. As both Science/Maths were being taught in English (PPSMI), these teachers need to improve their proficiency in that language.

In my school, English teachers stayed back every Wednesday for an hour to provide free English lessons to our colleagues. These classes were conducted under the directive of the Ministry. Time sacrificed but no one appreciate our effort. Many a times, our colleagues frowned as if they were 'forced and dragged' to attend such classes. These classes had been on-going since the implementation of Science/Maths in English way back in 2003.

Six years and yet a handful of Sn & Maths teachers since unable to grasp simple structures of English. Its difficult to teach an old dogs new tricks. They just refuse to change....

Sigh...

Judge a book by it's cover

Take a look at this picture...How many deer can you see ?

I'm at first glance, you may notice only one. However, after some serious concentrations, you may find another which is partially hidden. Right ?

Well... the same goes to our daily lives. More often than not, we usually make judgements based on the initial outlook. We rarely look deeper into it but already decide on the results. Just like how we judge people.

As a teacher, I dealt with thousands of human beings in the course of my duty. I often judge my students based on first glance.

"Oh...he's terrible...he can't even identify the alphabets...."

"He likes to disturb his classmates and never does his homework nor pay attention in class...he's a real nuisance.!"

"He'll surely failed his UPSR.....cannot even read a simple text.."

A familiar conversation between teachers in the staff room during break. That was a scene within the school compound. This could also happened in our daily encounters with people around us.

No matter how open minded we may claim to be, everyone of us make presumptions about others based strictly on first impressions. Seeing someone for only a split second, we may start to make assumptions on that person's attitudes, personality, and character.

We may tend to notice things about some one's appearance, mannerisms and features that we feel are grounds to pass judgement upon that person. We choose our friends based on these judgements.

Is this the right thing to do ? Let's ponder about it.

I had just completed a chapter of my Module (exams around the corner) and it discussed about Gardner's Multiple Intelligences. Well...as a teacher, I often label my pupils based on their appearances. Judging a book by it's cover shouldn't be a criteria ! Well..

According to Gardner, human are born with 9 intelligences. A person's profile reflects a unique configuration of these intelligences....just a matter of degree how these intelligences plays a role in our lives. A child who excels academically is usually Linguistically or Mathematical inclined. That's what our education system is all about. Those who scored strings of As are considered as excellent students and role models to their peers.

How about those who don't...? Some may not be good academically but they do excel in other fields like music or sports. These people boost their bodily kinesthetic, visual spatial or musical intelligences as in Gardner's theory.

Teachers or to be more precise ...the Malaysian education system often overlooked this point.

What say you.?