FINAL REFLECTION

1. What I like about blogging?

Blogging gives me the opportunity to share information and knowledge with other friends. We can share opinion and give comments to other people. Besides, it enables us to reflect the things learned in class and indirectly, it reflects my understanding about the content of the lesson taught in class earlier. Plus, by blogging, the teacher will be able to know the weaknesses of his or her lesson from the pupils' comments and reflection about the lesson. Thus, this enables teachers to evaluate his or her teaching and learning approach in order to suit pupils' needs.

2. What I do not like about blogging?

Since blogging is a medium where pupils can write anything that they like, sometimes, the content might offend other people and they might give the wrong interpretation about information to other people as it is only opinion. So, the content in blogging is not 100% true as it is only opinion given by the blog writer.

3. What have I gained from blogging eg. Language skills, improved fluency, critical thinking, improved thought processes, technology skills etc.

Blogging has improved my critical thinking as I need to think critically to reflect on the lesson. Besides, blogging improves my language skills and fluency. Plus, it improves my technology skills a lot. I never had any experience of creating and writing a blog before. Doing it for this course allowed me to be an independent learner as I managed to explore blogging on my own =)

4. How?

Reflecting and thinking of the doubts about the content of the lesson had improved my critical thinking skills and thought processes. I needed to question the areas that I did not understand and maybe search for the answer on my own. This, again, had developed me to be an independent learner. Plus, it indirectly, enhanced my technology skills as I had to search for information in the internet and designing my own blog creatively.

5. What I like about the course?

I like this course as it introduced me with the wonderful and creative way of using and developing resources for ESL primary classroom that I had never think of before. I admitted that this course have developed me to be a more technology literate person compared to the way I was before. I enjoyed learning new knowledge and explore new skills such as photo editing, audio editing, video editing, designing e-book and web publisher.
It was a life long learning and it meant a lot to me.

6. What I do not like about the course?

Honestly, the only thing that I am not happy about this course is that we were given too many tasks to be done.

7. What I have learnt from the course?

I have learned technology skills especially in photo editing, audio editing and video editing from this course. Besides, I have learnt downloading, converting, encoding and others.

8. What I do not expect but have learnt from the course?

Animation, Web Publisher.

9. What I expect but have not learnt from the course?

Nothing, I guess..

10.If I can change anything about the course, state what it is and explain.

a) Reduce the amount of tasks given to us. There were too many tasks given to us. They were quite difficult to complete and time-consuming especially when uploading our product. It took us a lot of time and even some of us did not manage to upload their work.
b) No last minute changes in instruction for the task and assignments. This is important to avoid confusion and frustration (maybe).

EDUCATIONAL SOFTWARE

What is educational software?

Educational software is software designed for use in school classrooms. It also includes computer games with learning values such as
SimCity series, Freddie Fish and others.

It can increase children's knowledge while creating a positive experience that encourages them to learn. This is because children love to play and learn indirectly in a joyful way. Besides that, educational software encourages active participation among the pupils as they need to engage with the activity while using the software. Thus, it creates a non-threatening environment for the pupils and lowers their affective filter during the teaching and learning activity in the classroom. This is important in order to build confidence and a sense of success among the pupils while learning the language. This is when the pupils manage to get the correct answer and obtain high marks while playing the game.

Moreover, educational software is dynamic and mobile as children can use it at home, in their own time. It can embed learning specific elements through repeated exposure and practice, and very importantly, provide instant feedback on performance. Furthermore, the learning value in good educational software resides in developing both the child's patience and ability to understand and follow instruction, developing problem solving skills, and gaining confidence in navigating software on a computer.

In order to use it in classroom, teachers should choose the right software that suits pupils’ level of challenge for the learner so that it is not too tricky and too easy for them. This is crucial so that the learning objectives of the lesson can be achieved successfully.

All the best!

Since we are still in the mood of Raya, we basically do our own work and continue doing the lesson plan assignment. I actually did halfway through the assignment except that I haven't done the teaching aids.

Unluckily, only two of my group members for this assignment were present today,Hafizah and I. The other three (Sakina, Mukmin and Kasturi) were absent. So, we decided to do our own work, searching for the materials and continue doing the lesson plan.

I guess I need to start doing my teaching aids now..

All the best!