REFLECTION

Being a part of the SEA Teacher Program is a huge opportunity. It provides one of a kind experiences. I really gained a lot because of this program. I gained self-confidence. I gained exceptional teaching experiences. I will never forget my teaching experiences with my students. I gained knowledge about cultural difference, different teaching approaches, and learners’ diversity. I learned how to address language barrier. I also learned that as a teacher, you should be the one to adjust in case of language barrier. A teacher should be resourceful and make her utmost effort so that your students will understand what you are teaching. I learned that each student is unique and diverse thus requiring different strategies in teaching. I learned about the cultures of Thailand and Indonesia. I tasted Indonesian and Thai foods like Randang, Tom yam kung, Som tam, and many more. I gained friends with different nationalities. I am thankful that I am part of this program and met diverse people with diverse personalities. They helped me adjust when I stayed in this country of Thailand. They helped me pick foods that would suit my taste buds. They helped me (student buddies) addressed the language barrier and taught me words that helped me in my everyday life in Thailand. They taught me how to commute and buy things. They helped me a lot.

This program actually exceeded my expectations. I have gained what I want to gain. I actually gained more of what I expected. Thanks to this program, I have grown a lot. This program made me love teaching more. This program provided me experiences and memories that I will never forget.

TEACHING PRACTICE

In teaching my Matthayom Classes, I always start the class a motivational activity. Some of the activtities I used was Word Search, The Boat is Sinking Game, Pair It up Game, and Fireball. The students loved the The Boat Is Sinking Game.

Afterwards, I proceeded to the lesson proper. I always posed questions and tried my very best to let my students understand me. I provided translations of my lesson with the help of my student buddies, Nua, Bam, and Noon. In solving, at first I used English, but after observing that some students cannot understand me, I switched in using some Thai language.

I used the Thai language for numbers and mathematical signs for better understanding. Sometimes I also switched in English so that the students can familiarize themselves with English. Before evaluation, I always give them activities or games. Afterwards, I also gave exercises that they solved in their notebooks. After class, my cooperating teacher always gave me feedback about my teaching. She told me that the students enjoy the class because I provided games. Time management was actually very hard because I provided some activities and the activities requires some mechanics. Explaining the mechanics takes time because of the language barrier so I often used body language like acting what the game is all about. Managing the classroom is quite hard. Although the students are disciplined, managing the activity is hard because of the language barrier. Also, some students are really not listening. So I thought of Fireball, to catch their attentions. This is what I did when I taught in Boonkum, I provided activities to catch the learners’ attention and to maximize learning.

OBSERVATION

Boonkumratbumroong School is a school in Khlong Nuang, Pathumthani, Thailand. This school has primary and secondary levels. The school follow the Thai Education curriculum. Also, they used Thai language in teaching Mathematics which is hard for me. Good thing I studied some Thai words related to Mathematics so I can somewhat relate when I was observing. The school has different technologies. Each classroom has an overhead projector or an widescreen LCD. The school also has bulletin boards that give useful information. Some rooms also have printers. In Matthayom classes, they have whiteboard and whiteboard markers. A lot of whiteboard markers, actually. The student teachers have books that they used in teaching. The students have the same notebooks that they used in taking notes and in answering exercises. But I observed that they don’t have or they don’t use their books in Mathematics. In case of evaluation system, exercises are always given in every class. During exams, they give written exams and the students are really behaved when taking their exams.

During morning ceremony, students line up before 8am. The morning ceremony consists of singing the national anthem, prayer, meditation and a speech from the teacher about ethics. Latecomers are given punishments like picking up trash and doing sit ups.

During lunch time, there is a time period for each year level. Students are given the same food with the same amount. The students line up to get their food, and they also clean and throw in the bin their leftovers and separate the plates from spoon and fork. The students always greet us when they meet us. When students fail to answer math problems given by the teachers they received a punishment.

I think the school has a very good discipline system.

sports day

The school also has sports day on Wednesday and Buddhist Prayer on Friday.

During my first week at Boonkumratbumrroong school, I observed the Matthayom 1/1, 1/2, 2/1, 2/2 and Prathum 2/1 and 2/3.

In Matthayom, I actually observed student teachers teach. I observed Ms. Oum, Ms. June and Ms. Fym. The three actually have the same teaching style. They will discuss two problems and will proceed to give exercises to the students to be solve in their notebooks. Afterwards, the student teacher will check on their answers and if they got everything correct, they will put a check mark on the students’ name on the students’ records. I think it’s a good thing to always provide exercises to the students to check their understanding, but I suggest to give varying activities to the students so that they will not get bored. Also, I think it’s also great if the teachers provide motivational activities at the beginning of the lesson to catch the students’ attentions, because I observed most of the male students are not listening and have their own worlds. Also, I observed that the student teachers always read their lessons before their class and discuss to the other student teachers if there are some things that they did not understand. The student teachers only used whiteboard and whiteboard marker in teaching. I think that’s understandable because they are teaching mathematics, and the topic only requires solving. But I suggest to use varying learning materials to maximize learning.

In Primary, the teacher (Ms. Rung-pirun) gave a word search activity to the students. The word search activity has pictures and she asked the pupils to color the pictures. She also asked the students to read each word that they found. I think it’s a very nice activity. It catered the Multi-intelligences theory of Howard Gardner because it’s consists of different intelligences like Linguistic, Kinetic, and Visual-Spatial.