First experience as a teacher in Primary School

LEARNING OUTCOME THROUGH OBSERVATION AND INTERACTION WITH STUDENTS

I am glad that I had the opportunity to sit-in for primary 4 and primary 5 classes for 3 days. Since the teacher-in-charge, Mdm Ting Nai had a three-day-ICTL course; I was instructed to help to manage her students. Through this opportunity, I had the chance to observe the development of these students in every aspect, namely intellectual, emotional, social and physical. Due to the school management, every student is being classified according to their academic achievement.

I realized that children are easy to handle if we know the appropriate way to interact with them. For good classes, most of the students are well-behaved. They listen and participate attentively while I was talking. Since I was new there, I briefly introduced myself to them. Later, I asked questions about them to get to know them better. I am aware that I am not supposed to teach anything new to the students. If they have no homework that needs to be completed, I revised the syllabus that they have learnt. For example, when I sit-in for mathematics class, I asked them to read out loud the multiplication table. Next, I threw out some questions for them to answer. Through this activity, I realized that the passion of mathematic is very strong. They even requested me to make more challenging questions. Even though a few of them get the wrong answer, it never stopped them from wanting to correct it and learn through their mistakes. Besides, they are also able to follow my instruction when I used English. From a conversation with the teachers when I was in the office, I get to know that the students in this school do not speak English much. Most of them speak Iban or their mother tongue at home. However, I noticed that a few of them are able to speak English fluently. When asked about the language they use at home, it was none other than English. Due to the fact that most students in class do not use English to communicate, these students pick up Malay language or Iban language from their friends.

When entering the worse class, I had prepared to be more strict in giving instruction, such as “sit down” and “be quiet”. It is inevitable that they are naughtier. They are unable to sit and focus for too long. They will eventually walk around the class and talk to each other. Some of them seem to be listening but in fact, they are daydreaming. Being unable to get own their attention at the first place has made me disappointed of myself. While watching those students throwing rubbish to their friends instead of throwing it into the bin, I realized that being a teacher is not easy. To be able to control a class of 30 students with different manner needs me to be assertive, that is able to express desires strongly and with confidence. My mistake was while asking some students to write the mathematics steps on the board, the rest of the students had nothing to do. When a selected student takes a longer time to answer, the class becomes noisy and unarranged. Finally, a repeated and imperative instruction “sit down” and “keep quiet” have calm the class. Hence, different approach is used on different kinds of students.

It is undoubtedly that each and every student comes from different family background. However, teachers should not favor only good students but neglected the other. Being a good teacher is also about putting effort in helping the weak students to excel in their studies without hoping for any reward.

All the best to the teachers!!