I had not been able to update this blog lately because I had been very busy with my practice teaching in Palawan National School. Planning my Lesson Plans (which include thinking of games, quizzes and method of teaching), preparing visual aids and checking and recording of quizzes had been my habits during my spare times. It was an arduous task – the practice teaching as a whole, I mean. Everything seemed to be a sacrifice, including the waking up in the morning even before the sun had risen and even if you hadn’t had enough sleep just to not be late in school. Nevertheless, all of those sacrifices would all be gone, if I entered the room with the thought in my head that I would again impart knowledge with my students. And If I could see that my students were enjoying the activities that I planned and scored high on the quizzes that would be enough for me as a reward for my hard work.
Throughout this experience of mine, I have come to understand better the meaning of the word “fulfillment”. I usually used this word every time people would ask me why I chose teaching as a course. I knew the meaning of this word but I just came to fully understand it during my practice teaching. I have learned that it is not just about satisfaction. It is more than that. In fact, there are many symptoms you can feel when you are fulfilled. One is when you know you needed a rest but you couldn’t because you wanted to continue what you are doing. It is also when your hair is all messed up because of working hard but you still feel beautiful. It happens when you think you felt you did a great job although at the back of your head you know there are some things you had neglected to do. It is when you couldn’t stop yourself smiling and your heart wanted to bursts because of happiness and you couldn’t help to tell everyone about the great job you did. I don’t know if those happen to everyone else but they always happened to me during my stay at Palawan High.
I think, I wouldn’t feel this way, if my students(III-Acacia, Acle, Alagao and Guava) didn’t made me feel that they did appreciate me and my Critic Teacher, Ms. Rosie Alvior, was not there to encourage me in every way possible when she thought I was loosing my drive. But although, I felt that my fulfillment is deeply indebted to them, I had to admit I was kind of pessimist when I learned I was assigned to be trained by Ma’am Alvior, which apparently teaching third year students. My reaction was not because I didn’t like Ma’am Alvior, but it was because of the fact that I would be teaching juniors. I didn’t like to teach juniors really and if were given a chance to choose I could have probably chose first year students. I thought the juniors were hard to discipline, that they already had this “attitude”. I feared that they might not respect me because I was horizontally challenged. You see, they were taller than I. Also, I thought, my teaching approach is best fitted to first year. But apparently, what happened was otherwise with what I wanted to happen to and whether I like it or not, I had to face the challenge.
So there I was standing in front of III-Acacia, my first class period, for the first time on the 4th of January because I was asked by my CT to introduce myself to them. I could not tell how they reacted because I really did not look at them but I had this feeling that they didn’t like me. Paranoid was probably the best word to describe me.
Many things happened after that first meeting. If I would narrate it, I would need a hundred-page book. So let me just sum-up my experience by sharing some highlights of my OJT.
MY FIRST WEEK in PNS was purely observation and observing just added pressure on me because my CT was very impressive. She was very fluent and consistently grammatically correct. Her students listened attentively to her. I could sense that her students respected her so much. While me, I was just a newbie, a student just like them, who couldn’t speak English fluently and yet, I was going to teach them.
MY FIRST INTERACTION WITH MY STUDENTS was on Friday of my first week in PNS, I had an enrichment lesson with them, which is a mini-quiz bee. I still could remember how nervous was I and how many times I stuttered because of that.
THE FIRST LESSON I TAUGHT THEM was direct and indirect speech. I didn’t like this topic. I thought it was hard. I took a lot of time planning my lesson plan for this topic only to revise it for three times. Well, you see, I wasn’t good at lesson planning. (I actually, thought before that I was good at it but I realized I wasn’t but I came to learn how to do it, day after day, with the help of my CT. Now I think, that I am the best Lesson Planner in our batch because my CT trained me well).
THROUGHOUT THE COURSE, I had learned lots of things from my student, which is Ironic because I should be the one who was teaching them. The most important lesson I have learned from them was the meaning of “fulfillment”, which I have mentioned earlier. Another lesson I have learned from them was to love your students so they would love you in return. Well, as I have mentioned earlier, I didn’t like them. That was probably the reason why at first, I felt they didn’t like me also. But when the time came I felt connected with them and I already loved them, they made me feel appreciated.
Another lesson I have learned from them, is “students love games”. My best classroom moments with them were when we were playing games. Of course, I and my CT made sure that the games I made them play were related with our lesson.
My students also taught me the fact that I should always be ready with an ice-breaker, even I was teaching a very active classes, because they might lose their interest anytime and they might not participate in the discussion. I remember, one time I had a hard time encouraging them to answer my question. All of a sudden, I thought of this strategy, which my classmate Raymond shared to me. He learned this form his CT, who was Ms. Pelotos. I made them all stood up, and then I asked them to follow the movement of my hands. If I raised my hands they had to stand up when I put it down, they had to sit down. They also had to follow the speed of my hands. If I put my hands down fast they had to sit down fast, too. Likewise, when standing up. When I moved my hand slowly, they had to also move slow. I put down my hands very quickly at the end so that they would be surprised. The most surprised one or the most inattentive one, of course, would usually sit down last. That last person who sat down had to answer my question. This strategy really helped me a lot in capturing their attention.
IN EVERY BEGINNING THERE IS AN END, that is how life revolves and likewise my Practice Teaching. I enjoyed my practice teaching so much that I didn’t realize it would end soon. If I would be given a chance to stay for another week and teach them, I would gladly do so but I think enough is enough and all I can do now is thank you to my students and to my CRITIC TEACHER. I learned a lot from all of you. I am glad I have met all of you. I will forever cherish the moments I have shared with you. I hope you do the same. I LOVE YOU ALL.
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