11th-7: The freedom writers: We write to end an unspoken war.

I've finally watched "Freedom Writers". It is a much anticipated movie taken from the very same "Freedom Writers" that operates now in the United States of America.

I've read about the real Erin Gruwell. But let us put everything aside, and look at one thing: In real life, Ms. Erin Gruwell lost her husband (to a divorce), but she has her "kids", and she has a foundation ( a non corporate NGO foundation) to work with. She is no longer a teacher, but she has inspired many others to do similar feats in their lives as teachers.

Chup

Okay. So Malaysia have different issues of a different magnitude. The little part of the world that I used to live in, and will be living in; they have different issues where I will have to be observant, and tackle it, if my abilities and boundaries concur. The catch of this idea is simple; I start getting to these kids, I might end up having "no life". In every equation, there is always a price to pay. Some are higher, some are lower. The question is; how much do I have to pay for my work? At what costs? It is always a matter of equal payment. Some pay with time, some pay with effort, some are by miracles, some are by matter of consequence.

Let us look at this:
This, inevitably brings me to a reflection of Dr. Edwin's work. The details are blurry, fuzzy in my consciousness. But I've begun to see in a new perspective on what he wants us (as teachers to be) to be, and how we can go about it.

I've seen, read and heard alot; on this, on that, even on good Dr. Edwin himself. To put it simply, it is a miracle to be in his class. It is an intellectual solace. It is a sanctuary for English and teachers-to-be scholars in the making. Note there are two nouns. I intended that.

Back to Ms. Erin, and back to here;

I remember my first day in my foundation years back in the good old Maktab Perguruan Gaya (now known as Gaya Teachers Training Institute). I have received a short poem, from my Head of Language Department back then; Madam Evelyn Lee Fung Choy. It read as following:

A teacher teaches;
A good teacher explains
A great teacher demonstrates
A wonderful teacher inspires.

That, to a comparison to Ms. Erin, I hope in the near future I can develop a teacher persona like her too.

A silent toast to Ms. ERin for her inspirational work in this one crazy world. For a moment I have a call.

Change all the ifs to whens in this post.

That sounds more inspiring.

10-0. Diaries & Letters, Van Goghm John Keats, Kafka. Revealed!

So we read some diaries and letters.

Seriously, I have never even thought of peering into the minds of these literature geniuses. But now that we are expected to read letters, diaries which were penned by them, I have the chance, even though I may have not wanted to have it at first. But let us stop right at this moment here. There is something worth for us to look into.

Dr. Edwin spoke of "do we speak language, or does the language speaks of us?"

So there are many revealing things about these literature geniuses from the way they write and communicate. It reveals their thought processes, how they write, how they think, and what are their inner thoughts. Reading into these letters and diaries; their outpourings allows us as readers for once to step in their shoes, in their catacombs of their minds.

But to be like them is totally out of the question. To even the least emulate them, that is by far a matter of ignorance and to a certain extent, 'blasphemous'. (though it is the wrong word to be used)

But it shows a wealth of knowledge. To everyone to be shared with.

9th Run: On Nelson Mandela, Autobiography and Uniformity

We read about Nelson Mandela, just an excerpt from his diary.

By the way, his diary can be found online. Full version.

The spesific extract was The Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, Part Eight: Robben Island: The Dark Years.

There is something worth pursuing in South Africa; breaking up the White hegemony, the Arpatheid. There is something powerful about this narrative. Yes indeed, it is seen through only from one perspective; Nelson Mandela's. But there is something unique to see from his perspective. It isn't because he's automatically deemed to be a honest, trustworthy narrator (as how readers will do question whether a character is trustworthy or not) or not but the power in describing the details and other people. That made him a unique narrator of his autobiography.

You see, compared to other autobiographies, Nelson Mandela's autobiography has a special flavour which one will rarely see in other autobiographies. It is the quality of perception, having perceiving eyes (and mind).

In autobiographies, people and personas have the natural tendency to put themselves automatically in the position of the protagonist. Others are automatically vilified, or having tendency to be villified.

Nelson Mandela doesn't put himself that way. He acknowledges that before he fought for an anti-apatheid system, he was challenging the system by seeking a replacement through another racial system. He acknowledged that he has changed, and this change brought forward his conviction that South Africa must be freed from any form of racist government (be it segregative or discriminative in nature), and that makes his autobiography a good insight about his mind and thought processes.

But in this chapter, one very interesting theme was about the dressing and uniform. To sum up, Nelson Mandela demanded that every prisoners should have a pair of long trousers. When he was finally offered one, he turned it down when he learnt that others have not been given the same treatment. That was because the uniform that he had will make him different. To be different would mean he'll be 'special'. And being 'special' doesn't always necessarily mean a good thing.

In this part of the world, often leaders wear, eat, and live differently from other common folks. But Nelson Mandela insisted that he should be treated equally. Note, he wasn't entirely all out angsty about every white warden. He was sympathethic to some few who where equavalently sympathethic to him.

He does not easily vilify others, or allow others to break his spirit. That alone is good enough to indicate why he is a good leader. And from his narrative, he manages to have me reading from that perspective; irregardless that how others are, we must strive to give the benefit of neutrality.

8 Ball: www.melta.org.my

MELTA

Malaysian English Language Teachers Association.

A nice place to be. Really.

Its not exactly a resource site, but it shows potentials to be a great one at doing that. It has a nifty forum, which I also take participation (as a requirement of the course) in its discussion. It is somewhat nice to see that there is a site where English Teachers, irregardless of their statures and background can meet online and discuss things with one another over things that people would have taken ages to address to. This is indeed information technology put to excellent use for the benefit of the teaching community.

Lecturers, teachers, instructors were here and there. And the amount of posts available are surely something worth to look at. By the time my count ended in April, I was heading for more than 40 posts. I know this was supposed to be written in February, I'm just updating the details.

But let's not get sidetracked.

This may be just an initiation, and provide irritation for some students. But I would like to remember that I was once a participant of this site, and I will like to see in the years ahead, how much can I benefit from this site, and how my students can benefit from our sharing with one another (from teachers to teachers).

Dr. Malachi has reminded us the importance of responding to one another's post. This isn't some joke. Foruming is a part of an ethical discourse. The idea is that we may not have the answer to everything, but we make know every little thing that may be of concern to the English Language Teaching community.

As a TESL undergraduate, so far so good I've learnt alot of good things from this site and its efforts. I think I would like to be a permanent member too, so that I can learn and contribute more.

7th Heaven: ongoing issues

So I've decided to work on one theme: Journey.

Life is a journey. Sometimes God, Providence (or whatever one would choose to call it, depending on the individual's beliefs) would play a cruel joke. Or perhaps its a beautiful fairy dream after all. Irregardless, how do we as teachers to be try to incoporate the theme of a journey to our students? What are the messages that we should be conveying? Are they of a moralist stand? Are they of a humanist stand? Or there is something else alltogether that we all ought to look out for?

I've begun selecting 4 novels. They're "The Little Prince", "The Alchemist" , "The Pilgrimage" and "The Zahir".

They all speak from 4 different individuals: A child, An adolescent, A Youth, An adult.

The question now poses itself: How do I play this game? For the moment, I have no suitable cards yet. Let's see how the situation plays itself out.

Wait. Why these few texts? Why not others? Surely there are better materials, like Marco Polo's travels, or Journey to the West. But I'm not too concerned. I'm concerned with an issue that has bugged me since the first day I did my position paper; how do I play my cards right?

6th: chinese new year out, problems in.

I met with my supervisor. She quickly threw in her rules.

I must admit, we're in for a tough ride. But in all neutrality, the toughness of it means that we'll be cracking our heads more intellectually. Therefore it means there's always opportunity to sharpen our wits.

By sharpening our wits, I'm not talking about outwitting my supervisor. No. Our supervisor wanted us to do something on a 'fresher' perspective. She wants to break us out of our comfort zone. And to her, breaking our comfort zone means we have to do literary pieces that we've not been taught from our entire selection of materials that we've studied thorough the years as an undergraduate.

But I am not at all affected. My comfort zone is "outside" the syllabus. To yank me out of it means a literal death for me.

5th Bombardment: D-Day on Position Paper

So it was a D-Day. Not this date. But I was after all, the earliest to present.

If you asked me, I've noticed that people only tend to listen when I'm ending an argument. Everyone in my class believes that the only lines worth listening to, (including Dr. Malachi himself) thinks that my last lines somehow sums up the entire arguments.

So it seems to me that I've still got a long way to 'cure' my oral presentation methods. Oh wait, does this line count too, since someone may think that it should be above before what I've stated?

Nevermind.

I'm not going to change this post, just yet.

To sum it up, I got a 3/5 for my oral presentation, and I lost it. Even worse was the fact that my computer crashed, and I sent it for repairs. Only God knows how much of cash I've spent just to send it all the way to and fro. It is really bad. I think. I can't fix my position paper, and I'm scared to ask Dr. Malachi. Erm, wait. It is more of I think I know what Dr. Malachi's response is.

But I think I've made a good stand on my position paper. I don't know. But for a piece of writing which I'll never be able to edit, I'm quite happy with it.

I've learnt that much later he wasn't impressed with the class. He thinks that there's immaturity in our arguments. Perhaps. We're after all, a sheltered group.

But let us not dwell too much in it. There is still time to redeem our intellectual honour, if there ever was one. Or attain it, if we do not have one.

See you on the next post.