Ms. Ting and 6O

Our last day photo

Ms. Ting Suzen has been committing to the progress of TISKL since it started. A local who had experience in teaching in her uncle's school for a couple of months whilst waiting for her SPM results.

Her welcoming hospitality was evident once we were "given" from Mr. Ferreira who dropped us off in the grand hall. She would try to include us into activities where we got a chance to experience how her class works, such as the routines, rewarding systems, her in-class work and etc.

Ms. Ting has certainly gained quite the experience in this profession, her dedication to nurturing her students can be seen from my five-day experience. We had a couple of side talks regarding her thoughts on the school.

According to her, TISKL was originally a local and national school (Sri Garden) and was in midst of transitioning to a more international basis. Originally worked as an ICT staff in a local department, she then applied to being a Primary teacher instead.

One of the challenges she as the first generation TISKL teacher faced was of course, the turbulence of the syllabus during the transitioning period. It was a time where the school was still converting to an inertnational school, yet the students until Year 6 had to sit for their UPSR exams. Fortunately, Science and Mathematics remained in English (as opposed to National schools, where Bahasa Melayu is used in all subjects, mainly those two of the three core subjects) thus there weren't much difficulty for the language format. According to Ms. Ting, the last batch of students who had to take the national exams was only two years ago which was pretty recent. Another challenge for her was to deciding the Learning Outcome based on the syllabus as it was still very volatile, between local and international, thus, this task required proper, well-trained teacher who had the experience in this situation was proven to be very useful. However, the tables have turned, it is Ms. Ting alongside her colleagues are more equipped and well prepared with their past experience.

Seeing that we are still young and fresh, she also advised us to have more confidence in teaching. Respect the students without putting the student-teacher relation out of the window. To her, teachers are the ones who should be respected as experience comes with knowledge, hence she believed that the students should also listen to the teachers and not the other way round. We were also told that we must be mindful of the way we talk: confidence and be firm. First-impressions are the most important stage in teaching a class, as it is to engrain the classroom values and desired behaviour which will be beneficial for the long run.

6O's daily activities

Like any other children, Year 6 students are still enjoying their pre-adolescent years before meandering into the cold and harsh reality where we call it "Life".

Surprised and alert at first when we announced our presence on our first day. Some we quick to ease up to the situation and began to make outdated meme jokes as soon as we introduced ourselves. We apparently, were being named "Jeff" when being asked for our names. Some rushed to help us answer their question: "My name Jeff!" was the most popular answer as many roared in agreement. A symphony of laughter was heard before they were halted by Ms. Ting who was true to her principles: respect and be firm.

All was good as they students were pretty comfortable with our presence and there were some who also seek for our help when they were attempting to finish certain classwork. They were a happy bunch.