i'm over with the position paper

Finally, I have completed the position paper. I have made some changes to it based on the comments given by Sheila. During the peer review session, she is in charge to assess my paper. She comments that my points are not well explored and the points are basically about the same thing. I have a mix feeling upon hearing her comments. Somewhere between disappointment and relief because it is just a draft and I still have time to make amendments on it. However, I think I owe her big time for her honest comments because it serves as a wake up call to me that my paper is not good enough to get an A. Hence with all the changes done, I am confident that now my final position paper is good. As for the presentation of position paper, I remember that Mr. Omid has asked us to prepare at least 15 slides, so i try to put in as much information as possible into my powerpoint slides. However, during my presentation, I realize that my slides are too long and some of my friends seem bored listening to me. In a way, it is bad experience for me..Haih..i don't think my presentation marks is going to be good this time..

My metaphor

The metaphor that I choose to describe myself as a teacher is of an
artist's kit. I envision a briefcase-type of thing fills with paints,
markers, glue, clay, pieces of this and that, and brushes and cutting
blades etc. In this metaphor, the student's are the artist, the
teacher is the kit, bringing all of the necessary supplies and tools
along in order to create an opportunity where the artist can "make"
their art, the classroom is of course the studio, the curriculum
is/are the materials within the kit, the administrator is a provider
of materials to fill the kit, and the parent is a supporter of the
artist. It seems to me that within the framework of this metaphor, the
classroom effectively becomes a huge artists' lab, where the teachers'
purposes should be to provide a variety of materials and opportunities
for the students' to play with them and in doing so, assign to them
meaning and function. Each student should be given freedom to learn in
the way they are comfortable with, thus as a teacher, I will try to
provide knowledge that will cater students' various needs so that they
can decide for themselves which one they prefer in order not to
restrict their creativity and their abilities.

a new perspective for reading.

I have the interest in reading story books since I was in secondary schools. They are mostly love story books. However,as time goes by and with the encouragement and recommendation given by Dr.Edwin, I feel that I have become more mature along with my interest in reading. I have expanded my reading materials to include non-fiction texts and ironically, those texts are now my favourite. After reading a few non-fiction texts such as The Last Lecture by Randy Paush and Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, I have a whole new perspective about reading books. I am able to comprehend now with what people mean when they say reading is a discount ticket to everywhere. (Quoted from Mary Schmicd) It teaches me about life and widen my knowledge on what is happening around me. It is like a user manual that gives me some ideas on how to face the challenges in life. I am looking forward to obtain more reading texts especially those that are recommended by Dr.Edwin. I am confident with his taste of books..heheh

My final thesis statement......

After having my first thesis statement rejected, I was thinking of using another texts that discussed on issues that I was more familiar with. After searching through the texts that I had learned in the past 5 years, I decided on choosing the novel, "Sense and Sensibility". My first intuition was to write something on the positive side of the quality of sensibility because most of the readers seemed to think that sense was a better value and sensibility leaded someone to make irrational decisions. However, I faced some problems in justifying my points. So, I tried to look at another aspect which was on the character, Elinor. Besides being sensible, Elinor was not much of a chatterer, she often observe people and incidents that happened around her before making a statement or decision. Then it was like.."Bang! I got my thesis statement". My thesis statement was Elinor's silence is a mark of her self-restraint, trustworthiness, consideration of others and personal strengths. Throughout the process of forming my thesis statements, I had Jasmit to help me. She helped me to search for supporting statements to test out my thesis statement and restructured my thesis statement so that it was clearer. Thank you alot! Owe you big time!

Thesis statement for position paper!

During the tutorial session with Mr. Omid, he had explained to us on what thesis statements was about and what was the criteria of a good thesis statements. According to him, our thesis statements need to be argumentative, specific and based on our personal views of the texts. We can either do our position paper based on poetry texts, short stories, novels or plays. My first thesis statement was based on the short novel, "The pearl" by John Seinbeck. I chose to talk about the evilness of the pearl that had caused the downfall of Kino's life. However, when my other classmates were presenting their thesis statements and based on the comments given by Mr.Omid, my thesis statement will definitely be rejected as the idea was already mentioned by the author so it was not really my idea. So I was like, "Arg..god help me to think of one thesis statement" Furthermore, the facts that most of my friends had already come out with their thesis statements and Mr Omid had already approved them made me even more stressful and worried. I must come out with a brilliant thesis statement soon!!!!

Simplified text for Daedalus and Icarus

After having discussion of the text, Daedalus and Icarus in the class, we were told by Dr Edwin to come out with a simplified version of the text in order to be used to teach secondary school students. I believed that having a simplified text was useful in order to make sure that students understand the major events in the story especially for lower-level proficiency learners. It was better to get something than nothing. The reason for it was if we were to use authentic texts in the class but most students were not able to read it, what is the point? It will lower down their self motivation to read as the students felt they were not good enough. In this activity, we worked in group of 3, Pui looi, Jasmit and I were in a group. We discussed on the main events in the story together in the class but due to shortage of time, I volunteered to write out the simplified text based on the points that we had discussed. The simplified text was then given to Pui Looi and Jasmit to check for any grammatical mistakes and they can add in points if relevant. I think we worked well together. We were now anxiously waiting for Dr. Edwin's opinions regarding the simplified text.

The fall of Icarus.

I fell asleep when I read the text for the first time. It all seemed so confusing. Then i realized that the extract given in our texts was not a complete version. I was supposed to start reading somewhere in the middle when it started with Icarus's father trying to find a way back to their country and suddenly it all made sense. I believed that the proverb, "Curiosity kills the cat" can be applied as one of the moral lessons in this text. Icarus was warned by his father to fly in the midway as the heat from the sun might melt the wax of his wings. He obeyed his father's instruction at the beginning of their flying journey but he became more adventurous and went against his father's words as he wanted to fly higher like the birds. Due to that, the wax on his wings melted by the heat of the sun and caused him to fell from the sky and drowned. In a way, he represented a sense of freedom, Romantic spirit, aspiration and individualism as told by Dr.Edwin. This was proven when he tried to do something that he felt right and different from others. During the lesson, Dr Edwin asked us to bring a picture and a poem of the "The fall of Icarus", there were a various different pictures and poems. I managed to get the right picture but the wrong poem.
It was true that pictures said a thousand words. From the picture, we can see that there was a boy drowning with one of his leg still on the surface of the water. However, as a whole picture, we can see that the other characters in the pictures were not aware of what was going on around them. They were just continued doing their routine jobs as a farmer and fisherman. Well, what i can say from this picture was in life there were two choices one can make, they can either take the risks in doing something different and accept the consequences or choose a monotonous lifestyle where everything will always be the same and risk free. I was rather curious to see the expression of Icarus's father seeing the fall of his son but it was not shown in the picture. Too bad..