mindfield

Yet another term ends. Am saying goodbye to my Red 2 and Intermediate 3. I don't think any of my students read this blog so I guess it's safe to say here that those guys in Inter3 are my favourites.

Well, of course, most of the other students are interesting creatures on their own right... it's just that these guys are what you might call ideal students.
It's not that there's not a weak student among them, there is. It's just that they're all intelligent students, perfectly willing to learn and they're not familiar with the term "give up." It's been a fulfilling experience indeed.

About the 15 7-8 y.o. students in my Red 2... What d'you know, all fifteen of them turned out to be very nice students. Well, of course, they're given to occassional burst of yelling and prancing around but they're all well-mannered and obedient. Some of them are even a bit mature beyond age and it's kinda amusing to see those qualities in such little frames.
Still, dealing with children classes, I was a bit apprehensive when deciding Best Student. Sometimes parents are more than a nuisance regarding this matter, more than their own child does. And to my amazement, sometimes they are perfectly unreasonable. They'd argue until kingdom comes without us knowing what the point was.

Oh, well, at the end of the day they just want a place to rant and rave about that small disappointment. Still, I don't think the teacher is the place to dump those kinda things. What are friends for, I'd like to ask.
Come to think of it, it's one of those modern parents' qualities that I certainly don't approve of. Most of the time, they want to see their children accomplish something just for the sake of bragging, not because they care about their children's developement and educational progress.

A student of mine who is also a mother of a Green student told me of a friend of hers, who decided to stop sending her child (6 y.o.) to our place because "...he's not fluent yet, after all this time!"
Well, what d'you expect? A 6 year old, whose mother tongue is Bahasa, starting to spout fluent English after a few weeks of joining the course? Can these parents get real?

Jeez.

The thing about enrolling a child to a children English class is to get them used to English. Not to make them speak. At least not yet.
In time, they'll start picking up a few things and memorize English vocabularies. I remember Claudia, who used to be my Green 3 student once asked me this, "Miss, not yet itu artinya 'belum,' ya?" Now, that's what I call success. She picked that up from my repeated, somewhat frustrated cries when she and her classmates were too eager to start yet another activities.

I believe Green classes are as much a confident booster as they are educating tools. So at these stages, we speak English to the children, using a lot of gestures that they'd be able to understand.
During my weeks of training, the guys and I hadn't gotten the chance to observe a Green class but I've found out from Iwan, who was in the next batch, that the Green teacher spoke no Bahasa at all and still managed to get the students (6 and 7 y.o.) to understand what she wanted them to do.

You see, that way the students will be motivated to learn English as fast as they can and also they'll have the confidence that they can understand spoken English.
If only it's that easy to penetrate the parents' brains.

Anyway... Liverpool made it!!! I glimpsed the schedule on the front cover of BOLA tabloid but came the big night I forgot. Otherwise, I would've asked to watch at Ugie's room.
Still, Spawn SMSed me the next morning and informed me of the good news. Yahoo, I jumped all over the room, yelling yes, yes, yes. Anyway, I still don't know who else got to the final, is it Milan?

Back to a more serious topic now, only last week a friend ask me whether I've let go of that last boyfriend of mine. Well, what do you know... not only have I let it all go, I've already gotten over things.
That's good news, right? That's why I've been feeling like I'm up to new challenge these days, including moving out of the place I've been living in for 7 years come 30th of May. (Believe me, knowning me, you'd know that moving out of a place is a challenge!)

Anyway, I'm looking for a place near the border of West Jakarta, either Puri Kembangan or Meruya. There are a lot of places to pick up from, it's just a shame that I hadn't really gotten the time to see every one of them. Oh, well, I bet I could spare some on the weekends.
And if any of you readers know where to find a nice boarding house or "kos-kosan" at the place specified above, please do leave a message. Gracias.

Whew. It's been sometime. I've been dropping by to write here but somehow managed to tire myself before I could compose anything comprehensible here.

I'm sooo left behind in the football scene. I'd no idea what went on in major championships, except maybe Champions League. And that was only because some colleagues informed me about the developement. At least, I knew the teams advancing to the next stage were Liverpool, Chelsea, Milan and PSV. ('sthat correct, people? Help me here!)
Looks like it's a goddamn good season for Chelsea. They're up for treble winning, I suppose. Still, it's not as easy as it seems. We'll just wait and see.

I've started teaching on Saturdays. Boy, is it tiring. But a good thing about these Sat classes is that the students are very satisfactory. In terms of willingness to speak, they're excellent.
Two of the students are actually parents of two Green-class children. It was quite a pleasant surprise to learn that I'd actually taught one of the said children and now teach his mother.

Time flies by teaching Saturday classes. Nice way to earn money, baby.

My PC's been sulking for some time now. And of course, that means I hadn't been logging in any writing hours. Damn. The more time I spend not writing the more my ideas seem to run dry. Anyone volunteer to bring my PC to the service centre?

Am currently in love with Michael Buble's new single Home. Told my boss that it was the soundtrack of life, "Let me go home..."
I bought the album and man, was it money gone for greater good. The album is worth ten times the amount I paid for it. My other fave are Save The Last Dance for Me and Can't Buy Me Love.

A pity that I should wait until I was at the office to be able to enjoy the album. My PC's still non-responsive!!!
Hope to find time to escort it to the service centre.