A Telescopic View of it All

Which is basically how I feel about my practicuum right now.

Ok, a little background info. This is the first week in my pract. school, which is a rather good school in my area. I've of course met my mentors and I've decided to give the impression of a total idiot. Well, not totally, but I've just been bombarding them with a million and one questions about the school and how things are run here and how the class is run, and I'll probably continue till they think I'm some crazed spaz.

Well, it's the only way I know to get the info I wanna know anyway. :p

but the one thing that really bothered me was my total lack of experience in handling a class.

I knew my mentor's class tended to be on the rowdy side, especially for the boys, but what I didn't realise was how bad I would be at managing them.

For one, the entire class decided to switch places and sit with their best friends! And I didn't remember their names or faces, let alone their seating arrangements, even though I knew some of them switched. Which is also why one of the first things I requested from my CT was a seating arrangement........ which I'm gonna bring into class every lesson from now on........

Then the usual ruckus. Half the class talking while I was talking. Some walking here and there. No one caring or paying attention.

*GIANT SIGH* thankfully this was just a relief, and not an observation. Bye bye, passing grade even.........

Though when I look back, I can see a few things wrong with what I did. I should've really properly introduced myself and most imptly, MY RULES. I donno why, but I had this nice little speech in mind to scare off the little terrors, and then, when it came to an actual classroom situation, I forgot it all!

Thank god I never went into acting................

I don't even know WHY is it I forgot, it just totally slipped out of my mind when I walked in, and I went straight into the lesson. *Sigh* Thank god my CT wasn't around to witness the debacle.

I only have a few things to prop me up on this. First, I'm making sure that next week, when I take over, I dedicate TIME to drill my rules into them, and let them know that I'm not gonna let u step all over me. [even though u may try, and some of u may be damn successful] Then I gotta scream at them a thousand times till they get it in their heads that I do NOT want those rules flouted.

And hopefully I get them into shape for my observation. *twists fingers*

Then I gotta remember the story of my friend too. I had a friend who actually joined the same time I did, but decided one week into the school experience that he could NOT do this.

One thing was that he had a rowdy class like this, which also made it hard for him to control the class. Finally, he decided that he could not do this for life, and sent in his resignation. MOE told him that he had to give 1 mth's notice, so he spent an extra month in that school contract teaching while I went to NIE.

Funny thing though. He said that the longer he spent in the school and in the class, the more he got the hang of classroom mgt. Even though ironically, he learnt the reins just in time for his contract to expire and now he's in the private sector.

So if he could do it after a while, why not I?

A guy was talking to the teachers during contact time just today. He said that sometimes we had to take a telescopic view of things, and look ahead. If we looked microscopically, then all we would ever see would be the short term failures that we did.

But if we looked far, and treated these as experiences...... maybe we might just see a better ending for ourselves.

Let's hope that applies to my teaching career as well.

All My Bags are Packed...

I'm aready to go.

Well, the bags aren't exactly packed, considering that most of the important stuff from my hostel room has already been taken out and put back home, ie the things I would most likely need for practicuum, so really all that's left in the room are excess stuff [that will only add to the existing useless clutter pile in my bedroom] that I don't need anyway.

And of course a whole host of memories.

It's strange that I could be even a little attached to this room after just barely 8 months of staying here, but after all it's kinda my home away from home now. The place where I can quietly sit, read, go on the Internet, do everything except work, without complaints from parents who think you should be spending your time productively all the time.

The more I live here, the more I think I'm getting a freaky sense of independence, that hey, I can actually live on my own, and not whine for mummy to do something for me. I can do it.

But of course, the hostel room has become more than that for me. It was the place of much afternoon naps, when I would doze off after a particularly boring tutorial, the only sounds being the whirring of the overhead fan and the low sounds of my roommate playing Maplestory. It's the room where we watched TV together and made snide comments at whoever was on TV.

It's the hall where we climbed the stairs, heaving and puffing, to finally reach our room, and stand there breathing heavily till we both caught our breath again. It's the room where we trained our leg muscles to stairclimbing perfection.

It's the hall where we had to walk down the corridor to the bathroom, and key in a 3 number code just to take a pee. It's the hall which served better food than any stall in NIE, or even NTU for that matter.

It's the hall where I would take my laundry down all those flights of stairs, and lounge in the lounge reading while waiting for my laundry to finish. It's where I excused myself from work, saying that I had to do the laundry.

Can you even call these memories? I think what I'll bring with me is the general feeling and impression of the place. The feeling of calm, of rest, and my beckoning bed. The feeling of coming home to rest thy weary bones at last. And all a convenient few minutes away from our classrooms.

And now that practicuum is starting, we won't be here till around May, and even then, we have at most one or two months before we completely vacate the room and return to our original addresses.

I'll miss the place.

Practicuum Postings are Out....

And you can hear the screams from NIE to all over Singapore.

My friend is currently bemoaning her posting to her old contract school, where she had the most marvellous time of her life being treated as free, underpaid labour under a tyrannical buffoon of a principal. [and NO, I will not reveal the name of the school or the principal]

I'm bemoaning my posting to another school which was NOT the school I went to for my 3 week school experience, a good school which I liked, had nice staff, a good mentor, and was comfortably getting used to, before I had to go back to NIE.

I've been posted to a good school again, the benefits of living in a decent area of Singapore. [note that, all potential teacher-wannabes] BUT I'm still dreading it, because I've heard that that school had a reputation of some of the most kiasu-fied crazy parents around Singapore. *faint* I can see myself with the Valium already.

Other than those, I'm also worried about a few other things.
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OMG!! WHAT THE HELL DO I DO IN SCHOOL?? WHAT IF THE KIDS ARE DEMONS?? WHAT IF THE TEACHERS HATE ME?? WHAT IF THE PRINCIPAL IS A DICTATOR?? WHAT IF THE PARENTS ARE OUT TO SCREW ME?? WHAT IF I HORRIBLY SCREW THIS UP?? WHAT IF I HAVE TO REPEAT MY PRACTICUUM?? WHAT IF I SCRAPE THROUGH IT BARELY ALIVE AND BLEEDING AND I GET STUCK DOING IT ALL OVER AGAIN IN JULY?? WHAT IF I CANNOT MAKE IT THROUGH?? AACCCCKKKKk!!!!!!! ARRRRGGGGHHHHh!!!!!!!!!!!! SCCCRREEECCHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!
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*cough*.
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Ok now I'm better.

But seriously, I would love to hear about other's practicuum experiences. If nothing, at least it'll give me a good idea of what I'll be going through in about 2 weeks....... send in your comments, please!