A LiL cloSER to HOME...

conFESSION of A SEEDWIKI saboTAGER…
Very first thing before I continue on with this week’s entry: I think I had destroyed the help page on SeedWiki. I was trying to post the problems that the class (and I) were facing. I went on the help page, click on edit page and type in all the problems. All of the sudden the rest of the ‘Help’ messages had gone. I sat at the edge of my seat and sweat. Gosh! At the mean time the server was down and I lost connection to the SeedWiki. Wonder what I should do next. To Ken of SeedWiki, “HELLLLLP MEEEEE!!!”

Let’s Chill…
I thought I should take my mind off the SeedWiki problems for awhile. Therefore, during the last one hour class of PKEY3101, I resolved to reflecting on the Prof.’s teachings (more relaxing this way, I guess ). “From Sarawak with Love” was on the SmartBoard with the picture of cute Sarawakians children making ‘V’ signs and cheery smile. Kind of getting homesick for a minute. Although I’m not a pure Sarawakian: actually I’m a Sabahan but my parents and relatives all live in Kuching, Sarawak, I have been missing home for quite awhile. I miss home, I miss my daddy, mummy, brothery (even though he’s a pain in the neck for me, well, vice versa :p), my doggy Coco, my lovely Sarawak Laksa… To my dismay, my mom just called me few days before telling me that I don’t have to go back home as my family is planning to visit KL (for the don’t know how many times already, I have lost count) AGAIN. Why! Why! Nevermind, I plan to go back home no matter what, right after the finals, I will be back home! Yippie! But maybe I need to sponsor my own air ticket. Sponsors perhaps? Please mail me: kylin11@hotmail.com Hehehe…

To Sarawak with L.O.V.E
The land of the Hornbills. The city of cats. The land of vast greeneries and long-winding rivers. With crocodiles mostly. Sarawak.
And the Prof. was in peaceful Sarawak last week. Therefore, this week we were going to talk about SARAWAK! She shared with us the pictures that she had taken of the schools that she had gone to. Unfortunately, I had not been to any of the schools that she had mentioned. I thought that the schools were located ‘in the heart of Sarawak’. To tell the truth, I have never been to a ‘rumah panjang’ (is the museum of Sarawak counted as a rumah panjang? It looks like one…) and I have never been to the famous Sarawak river express boats (I boarded a sampan before at the WaterFront in Kuching…only 30cents!). So, if I were posted to the schools that the Prof. was talking about, I never did mind.
The Prof. was telling her experience visiting schools in Sarawak. Her stories sounded like great adventures: aboarding the weird-looking express boat, crusing on the wide and murky Rajang river (got Crocs or not…) some for about 3 hours and some even up to 7 hours ride, walking through the wobbly some-sort-like-London-bridge hanging bridge and so forth. There were places that I never knew were in Sarawak: Kuala Mani (crooked thought provoking name, now the name was changed into Pangkalan Manis), Selangau, Dalat, and Nan Kiang School. There was also a place that the Prof. adventure team dreaded and left out from their trip: Sungai Arau, as one need to travel up to 7 hours on speed boat and climb a hill in order to get there (sounds very much like Indiana Jones!).

Should Curriculum Drive the Technology or Should Technology Drive the Curriculum?
The Prof. threw a new question to us. The good thing was, I could add this enquiry in my writing. The bad thing was, my mind blurred again as I figure out what it actually meant (perhaps due to brain malfunction again~).

As I thought back, perhaps the idea of driving a car can best illustrate the question. Imagine a brand new BMW M5 sporty car fully equipped with iPod which has the technology of locating your position on a map through satellite transmition. Imagine that the car is yours. Of course as the driver, you would drive the car and travel to places you wish to go. You perhaps would not like the idea of letting the car take you to places that you do not want to go. The car does not have human intelligence. What the car needs is a person to operate and utilize it. Without the driver, the car would be nothing, not even if it is BMW with iPod. The same goes to educational technology. What are the significance of PPSMI, CDI, My-CD, E-bahan, LCD and even notebooks provided by the MOE (Ministry of Education) and schools if they are being treated as holy scripts that were supposed to be hidden and locked in the tower of a palace?

As I had noticed from the Prof., those teachers that got her praises for utilizing technology in the classroom (during her observations in schools in Sarawak) more or less had put much effort in previewing, preparing, presenting, practicing and post-testing (the 5 Ps) the integration of technology in a classroom. The ‘backstage’ preparation and planning for a teacher before ‘presenting an act’ of teaching for the pupils ‘on the stage’ of the classroom was essential.

anCORE...
As I talked about Sarawak this week, I tried eating Sarawakian food at Millenium Court in the evening. I was so joyful to see a stall selling what they claimed to be Sarawak Kolo Mee (Sarawakian Syaiful also knew what is Kolo Mee). Sadly to say, the mee was not even close to the taste of the real, authentic thing. Anyway, I'm looking forward to be back again in Kuching...in November, that is :)